


Crash Down (Break this Heart of Mine)

by Taste_is_Sweet



Series: Dread and Darling Boys [6]
Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV), Captain America (Movies), Marvel, Marvel (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Bucky Barnes Feels, Bucky Barnes Needs a Hug, Dissociative Identity Disorder, F/M, Families of Choice, Gratuitous Kitten References, Hurt Bucky Barnes, Hurt Steve Rogers, Hurt/Comfort, Jarvis Is Not Infallible, M/M, Mental Breakdown, Minor Character Death, OTP: Not Without You, OTP: Till the End of the Line, Protective Avengers, Protective Pepper Potts, Protective Tony Stark, Sick Bucky Barnes, So Does Everyone, Steve Rogers Feels, Suicide Attempt, Tony Stark Has A Heart, Very Minor Crossover
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-12
Updated: 2014-09-12
Packaged: 2018-02-17 03:48:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 10
Words: 84,811
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2295590
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Taste_is_Sweet/pseuds/Taste_is_Sweet
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Yeah, well." Tony gestures at Bucky. It should feel stranger than it does that they're both watching him sleep. Maybe more invasive, too, and Pepper thinks it probably would if she couldn't tell how concerned Tony is. "Turns out I was a little premature, when I said we all came through all right."</p><p>Pepper looks at him. "What do you mean? What's wrong with him?" She gasps. "<i>Is</i> it Steve? Is that why Bucky's not with him?"</p><p>Tony shakes his head. "Steve's fine. Well, physically fine, considering." He takes a breath. "Remember last year, when Sam and I found Bucky trashing that bank vault where Hydra'd been keeping him?"</p><p>She nods. "You called it the 'Vault of Evil'. Oh my God, did they try to capture him?"</p><p>"No, but it's almost as bad." He grimaces. "I'm not explaining this right. You remember why we took him to Asgard? I mean, of course you would, it was your idea. But, how he had, like, four different people running around in his head?"</p><p>"Of course I do. But, they fixed him." Her eyes go wide at the misery in his expression. "It's been over a year…I thought they fixed him?"</p><p>"They did fix him," Tony says. "He got broken again."</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Squeaky](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Squeaky/gifts).



> I feel I should apologize for anyone who's been waiting for this. I'd planned to finish this in August, and then it got long.
> 
> Crazy, stupid long. Seriously. I was tempted to add 'And a cast of thousands' to the tags.
> 
> This is actually the third-longest thing I've ever written that didn't have a co-author. I'm not entirely sure how that happened.
> 
> I hope you enjoy it, though. And I thank you very much in advance for taking the time. :)
> 
> (P.S.: You don't need to read the entire series to understand this fic, except for _The Right Way To Fall_. I do recommend reading _The Kind You Stop_ and _A Safe Place In The Dark_ though, to get the full context if you don't want to read all the Ward stories.)

"Is it just me? Or am I right that this is nuts?"

"It's just you," Clint responds, because he's a jerk. He lets his arrow fly, waits a second then grins. "Ha! That's another twenty points."

"Twenty? What the hell for? My grandma coulda' made that." Bucky sights through his rifle scope, tracking the guy who looks like he got mugged by an army surplus store after having sex with a nail salon. He's too scruffy to be real military but fights too well to be some random escaped experiment—the Avengers have fought enough of those to tell the difference, thanks—and he and 80 of his asshole pals are organized enough to be an army, except for how they all went nuts all over New York for no reason. At least nothing Bucky can figure.

This mook, for example, is strutting around the fifteenth floor of an office building, waving his gun at a bunch of terrified office workers. It looks like he's holding them all hostage, except he hasn't tried to talk to the police even once. All he's done is shoot people. The SWAT team waiting to go in said he killed four civilians as soon as he got up there. They know that because he didn't care if anyone used their phones to call 911. Which makes no fucking sense.

Neither do the four dead people Bucky can see crumpled on the floor next to their desks. They all were sitting with their hands on their heads, like good prisoners. The dickhead shot them anyway.

Bucky waits until the mook dickhead with the big, green insect thing on his arms crosses right in front of the window, far enough away from the civilians that they won't even get too much of his brains spattered on them when Bucky shoots him through the back of his head.

"Ten points," he murmurs as he pulls the trigger, because unlike some people he has no need to exaggerate. He smiles grimly as the guy drops. It doesn't make up for the people he murdered, but at least there's a little less evil in the world. Bucky likes that.

He's got a hell of a lot of red in his ledger. He knows he won't ever be able to clear it, but once in a while he can even it up a bit. It's something.

"Don't sell yourself short. That was at _least_ twelve," Clint says. He's got his arm back ready to pull an arrow from his quiver, eyes searching the streets far below them. But there're no more targets. "Huh. Looks like we got 'em all."

Bucky grins at him. "This is Winter Soldier. The target has been neutralized. Repeat, the target has been neutralized. You boys can go in anytime," he reports to the SWAT team. He waits for the acknowledgement (he can do without the thanks) then switches the channel to the one only used by the Avengers. "Sector twenty cleared." He still thinks it's kind of amazing that the radios are tiny enough to fit in their ears, but it's way more convenient than the backpack radio transceiver Gabe carried around, though his was homemade and way more powerful than what the regular Joes got. Gabe would've loved this one.

The middle of a mission's a hell of a time to get sentimental, so Bucky just shunts it to the side like he does with all the stuff he doesn't like thinking about. He promises himself that he and Steve can drink to the Howling Commandos once all the guys with the green centipede things on their arms are rounded up or dead.

"Too slow, Frozeneye. So sorry," Tony says with dizzyingly fake remorse. Bucky can hear _Run to the Hills_ by Iron Maiden blasting in the background and smirks to himself. Tony's been introducing him to all his favorite bands. Iron Maiden's pretty good. "Team Airstrike would like to report that they have kicked all your asses and already cleared all our sectors. We've delivered our centi-prisoners and are currently assisting with evacuating the wounded. Because we're just that awesome."

"Team Winter Hawk dropped eight targets in six minutes in sector twenty. It took longer than that for us to get here. So we still rule," Clint says easily. He grins at Bucky as he slides the arrow back into his quiver and folds his bow. "And we still have the coolest name." 

Bucky stands up and shoulders his rifle, clapping Clint on the shoulder. "Nice going anyways, fellas," he says to Tony and Sam. He just shrugs when Clint rolls his eyes. They head back inside the building, going down to street level.

"You mean, 'fucking awesome, dudes'," Tony gleefully corrects him. "Come on, Bucky. It's the new century. Get with the lingo."

"Tony," Sam says. He sounds exactly like he's spent the entire day with him.

Bucky says, "How 'bout I get my foot so far up your ass that you'll taste rubber?" to Tony in Russian. Let his robot suit translate it for him.

He can hear Natalia smirk in the background. "Team Green Widow has cleared all our allotted sectors and Hulk and I are assisting with subway evacuation. And Tony, you don't want to know what he said."

"Too late," Tony sighs dramatically. "And I have to say, I'm disappointed by your attitude, Bucky. Here I am, trying to impart my cultural expertise—"

"Knock off the lip-flapping, Tony," Steve says, and Bucky can hear the grin in his voice, though it's obvious he's running. Wherever he is, it's closed-in enough that there's a slight echo. He's either inside or on a narrow street somewhere. "I'm in sector 12, in pursuit of a centipede."

"Ooh, I see what you did there," Tony says to him, but then he does actually shut up.

"My sectors are also clear," Thor booms over the radio, loud enough that Bucky winces despite how he and Clint are clattering down the stairwell. "I am aiding the warriors of the National Guard in freeing people from a collapsed building, but I can come to you if you require assistance, Captain."

"Thanks, Thor, but I'm fine," Steve says. "I do have a feeling this guy's trying to lead me into an ambush, though. Stand by…"

"Think he's really fine?" Clint says to Bucky. They're physically closest to Steve's position, though any of the flyers could probably get there faster if they really pushed it.

"Sure," Bucky says.

They both speed up anyway.

By the time they're back out on the sidewalk they can hear on their radios that Steve's in a brawl. He was right about the attempted ambush: the centipede he was chasing led him into a residential area full of old, rundown buildings and narrow alleys. Steve was expecting it when two more centipedes jumped out at him. He sounds only slightly strained in Bucky's ear as he tells them, and more like he's having a hell of a good time getting his licks in. There aren't that many people outside of his team who can give Steve much of a fight.

"You sure you're fine?" Sam asks. "We can be there in, like, six minutes."

"We're closer," Clint cuts in. He and Bucky are jogging now. Not exactly worried, not exactly taking their time. He checks his watch. "ETA, five minutes."

Bucky hears Steve grunt, but he can tell it's with effort, not pain. "I'll be here."

And then there's the unmistakable sound of a gunshot. And then there's nothing on the radio except silence from Steve and everyone else calling his name.

Bucky and Clint run.

They get to the alley two minutes later. Bucky sees a stranger in black armor that looks like his used to, with the same fucking face mask he hated because he couldn't breathe in the damn thing. And a metal arm with the Hydra symbol painted on the shoulder where Bucky used to have a red star. It's like looking at a fucking mirror from when he was the Asset, except this asshole's got close-cropped black hair and dark brown eyes. 

And then this new Hydra Asset says, "I'm sorry" and he's going to kill Steve and Bucky is so consumed with rage that it's like he's got that mask on again, like he can't breathe. And he knows that yeah, maybe they scooped this punk out of a snowbank too. Maybe he didn't ask to be made into a walking weapon either. But he shot Steve and now he's going to gut him, and Bucky doesn't give a shit who this Asset was. He hurt Steve and he needs to die.

He needs to die. Bucky shoots his Glock's entire magazine at him. The Asset deflects the bullets with his metal arm, but he doesn't see Clint's arrow.

It should've dropped him, but if he's like Bucky then he's souped-up on knockoff super soldier serum, so it's no surprise when he just rips the arrow out of his side and jackrabbits for the nearest building.

Bucky's still vibrating with rage but now that the threat's gone he can look at Steve, and Steve is a fucking mess. He's got blood all over his face and his left leg looks like Hydra's new plaything went nuts on it with a pickaxe. There's blood _everywhere_ and for a second it's like Bucky's standing somewhere else, watching himself scream Steve's name in a voice he doesn't even recognize. 

(And he doesn't know how Steve got hurt so bad, and why he wasn't there to protect him. He should've been there, and now Steve is on the ground and he's bleeding…)

Then Steve shouts, "I'm all right! Go! Go!"

Steve sounds like he got his bell rung but good, but he's awake and talking and Bucky blinks and he's back inside his body. But the new Asset is almost to the top of the fire escape.

Bucky takes off after him.

Whoever this sob-story used to be, he's fast. Even wounded, he's leaping rooftops like he's got Sam's wings. Bucky's running like crazy but he's an entire building behind.

He's going to catch up, though. The guy's faltering, clutching his side when he's not using both arms to jump. Five rooftops away from the alley he drops his facemask. Bucky glances at it as he goes past. There's blood inside. There are more little spatters of it here and there on the concrete and tar, dropping from the Asset as he runs. He's still a building ahead when he almost lands short, barely catching himself so he can somersault onto the roof. This time he only runs to about the middle of the rooftop before he turns around and lifts his handgun.

 _Good_ , Bucky thinks. He's itching for a fight. Rage is still burning through him, red as blood behind his eyes. It doesn't feel quite right, doesn't fit, like there's someone else with him egging him on. Almost like he can see another man out of the corner of his eye. He's wearing a dark blue jacket, olive drab pants. Same dark brown hair and blue eyes, except his eyes are iced over with fury. 

But Bucky ignores it, because this barely-human _fuck_ hurt Steve, and _nobody_ does that. It's the one thing Bucky has to keep him going since Steve rescued him from Zola's lab. He loves Steve, and it's his job to protect him. It doesn't matter if Steve's bigger than Bucky now, or if he can finally hold his own in a fight. He still doesn't watch his own back enough, still lets his big, stupid heart lead him around and get him into trouble. So Bucky watches his back like always, only now he does it with a sniper rifle. His aim's even better than it used to be.

Protecting Steve keeps the rage away. It keeps Bucky from thinking about Zola and how he leered at him behind his glasses, or all the shit he pumped into Bucky's veins until James was just screaming and screaming and screaming—

Bucky wakes up skidding off the roof.

Except, he wasn't out. He remembers deflecting the bullets, remembers the Asset saying, _"What are you?"_ , breathless with shock and the blood filling his lung. Bucky remembers tackling him to the tar, shoving his left arm across the guys' throat with all his weight behind it. He remembers realizing that this Asset has two metal arms and being grabbed and getting thrown. He knows why his left side and his right arm hurt.

But he doesn't remember it like he was there. He remembers it like he was watching someone else.

Doesn't matter. What matters is that he's back on his feet with a knife in his hand before the Asset can do more than drag himself to standing. He's hunched over with both his hands holding his side, panting with exertion and pain. He's not fast enough to stop Bucky from driving him into the wall of the stairway cupola, and the Asset's head cracks so hard against the concrete that for half a second his eyes go blank.

It's almost long enough for Bucky to shove his combat knife into the Asset's eye, but he comes to, gets his hand up to block it then crushes the blade. He shoves Bucky's arm back and it fucking hurts, but Bucky kicks him in the leg and gets him down with his left hand clamped around his throat. And this time Bucky makes damn sure the bastard isn't getting up again.

"I'm the Winter Soldier," he snarls at him, answering the question. "And I'm the one who's going to kill you."

The Asset's eyes are huge, and Bucky can see that he doesn't understand, that something's missing in his head where their machines ripped it apart. Bucky recognizes it. He _remembers_ it: how beneath the certainty of the mission he was as lost as a child in the dark. This man is lost too.

 _He needs help_ , Bucky thinks. _I shouldn't do this. I don't want to do this_. But his hand is still tightening around the Asset's throat, and his struggles are weakening and he's going to pass out soon and then he'll die. And Bucky's not letting go.

He's kind of fighting with himself and kind of not, because he came after the Asset to kill him and that's what he's doing, even though he doesn't want to. So he's not paying enough attention and he doesn't see the little metal bug until the Asset slaps it onto his left arm.

He doesn't see it, but he can feel it like a needle going in, like his arm has real muscle and nerves and the tiny machine is stabbing it. He grabs at it immediately, but just before he can yank it off it beeps, and suddenly his left arm is _dead_ and then—

God, the pain—

The pain. The pain. The pain is every muscle clenching like animal teeth around his bones and he screams until he can't breathe. And he's in the chair again and they're tearing him to pieces and there's lightning inside him instead of blood. Nothing left of him but lightning and pain, and he can't move and he can't breathe and he reached for the banister and missed and he reached for Steve's hand but the handle broke and he's falling and falling and falling—

There's another man on the roof with him. Bucky knows him, with his dark blue Howling Commando uniform and his eyes like ice. And Sergeant Barnes reaches out his hand and says, "C'mon, James. Bucky needs you."

James is quaking from fear. But he wipes his eyes and reaches back.

* * *

"How seriously should we take Steve saying he doesn't need help?" Sam asks over his radio. He smiles at the nurse as he hands him the little girl from his arms. Her wrist is broken, but she was way more interested in getting carried by a 'real life superhero', and she's all smiles and gushing conversation as the nurse nods and smiles back at her.

"I never take anything Steve says seriously." Tony lays the girl's mother down gently on a gurney and the nurse lets the girl ride with her mother into the building. The woman broke both her legs protecting her daughter from falling debris. They're far from the worst injured, though, which is why Sam and Tony volunteered to fly them to a hospital far enough away from the attacks that it won't be overburdened. "But he sounds okay, so…" Tony shrugs as they both leap back into the air.

 _They leap into the air._ That will never get old for Sam. His Falcon suit (Mark 3 of the Stark suits) does, actually, have laser-guided missiles like Tony promised. But even better is how easy it is to maneuver and get off the ground. Tony proudly told him that it uses a variant of his own repulsors, though they're dependent on Sam's wings for balance instead of his hands. 

Sam just loves them.

He also loves being an Avenger, but that is very dependent on all of them being whole and breathing, so he asks Steve, "You sure you're fine? We can be there in, like, six minutes."

Clint says he and Bucky are closer, and when Sam looks at Tony, Tony shrugs. They're both turning to head back to their sectors and evacuate more people when they hear the gunshot. And Steve stops responding.

"Oh fuck," Tony says, vehement as a prayer. He turns in the air and speeds up so much that Sam can barely keep up with him.

J.A.R.V.I.S. has Steve's coordinates and they're both going so fast now that Sam can feel the heat where the engine of his wings are strapped to his back. If he keeps this up he's going to be burned, but he just makes a mental note to tell Tony later and keeps going.

When Sam hears Bucky over the radio screaming Steve's name, he's sure that's it, Steve's dead. And then he hears _Steve_ saying that he's all right and Sam's so relieved he almost drops out of the sky.

"God damn it, he really needs to stop doing that," Tony says. He's panting with adrenaline. "Clint, what's happening?"

"Steve got shot," Clint says uselessly. Sam's got his mouth open to ask for details when Steve himself comes on.

"I was shot at by a Hydra assassin. But he missed."

"Where did he shoot you?"

"I'm in the alley."

"Yeah, okay, I'm guessing head, then," Tony says. "Clint, tell me what the fuck happened to Cap so I can let the paramedics know."

"I'm all right," Steve says. "You need to help Bucky. Bucky went after him."

"I don't need help. I've almost got him," Bucky says suddenly over the radio. He's breathing hard, and Sam can hear the steady pounding of his footsteps.

"We'll help Bucky, don't worry," Sam says to Steve. He's automatically fallen into the voice he uses to talk people down from panic attacks. Steve's not panicked but he definitely sounds out of it. "Tony's already scanning for him. But we need to know what happened."

"He was shot in the head from the top of a five-story building," Clint fills in. "If the guy was even half as good as me Cap would be dead. But he just lost a chunk of his ear. He's definitely concussed, though. He also has a broken nose and a split cheek and one hell of a laceration in his thigh. But the assassin didn't get the artery."

"I'm all right," Steve says again. "Are they going to help Bucky?"

"Yes, we are going to help Bucky," Tony says. "I'm scanning for him right now. J.A.R.V.I.S. says the paramedics are about four minutes out. Nat, don't let our favorite rage monster squish them. You know how protective he gets."

"I'm keeping him well away," Natasha says. She sounds a little out of breath and behind her it's obvious the Hulk is smashing things in the background. "Steve," Natasha speaks right to him, "if you can hear me, I know you're trying to get up. Stop moving or I'll kill you."

"You heard her, right, Steve?" Clint says. He makes a frustrated noise. "I can't believe I thought she was exaggerating. Cap, if you don't stay still I swear to God I will beat you unconscious."

"I'm all right," Steve says. "Is Bucky okay?"

"He's kind of adorable like this," Tony says. Then he points. "There he is." He swoops down and speeds up without warning, so that Sam's forced to scramble to keep up with him.

But now Sam can see Bucky as well, though only barely in the fading daylight. Bucky and the assassin he's pursuing look like ants from this distance. Smaller, actually. They're just tiny dark shapes on a dark grey background. He can't believe how fast they've been able to move in such short a time. They're running along the rooftops, jumping from one to the other. It's amazing to watch, actually—that kind of phenomenal, inhuman grace and strength and speed. Sam winces unconsciously when the microscopic man in the lead almost falls, but he manages to roll onto the roof and turn to face Bucky as Bucky leaps after him.

The fight, what Sam can see of it as they close the distance, is short but brutal. Someone nearly gets tossed off the roof and Sam knows it's Bucky by Tony's shout of alarm. Afterwards Tony has to convince Steve that Bucky's all right several times, but by then they're almost close enough for Sam to see the fight without needing artificially enhanced vision.

"Um, Rocky over there's not actually going to kill him, is he?"

"No," Sam says with complete confidence, despite how he still can't see what Tony's looking at. Bucky has killed, as recently as today, but never arbitrarily. Never when he doesn't have to. "He's just—"

"Oh, shit," Tony says suddenly. And then Bucky starts screaming.

Of course the comm goes insane, but Sam ignores it. He pushes his wings until the harness is painfully hot against his back. When they get to the roof Sam catches a glimpse of the assassin—his metal arms and black armor, and the Hydra symbol on his visible shoulder like they don't give a damn if he's seen—but Bucky is still screaming in agony and when the assassin runs and jumps for the next roof Sam just lets him go.

Bucky's writhing like his muscles have gone haywire, except for his left arm which isn't moving at all. It looks like every few seconds he's in some kind of spasm, like he's being electrocuted. Sam doesn't know how he's able to breathe.

He lands just behind Tony, who wrenches his helmet off and drops it, then drops his metal gloves with a flick of his wrists, leaving his gauntlets on but his hands bare. He never takes his eyes off Bucky and the tiny, innocuous little metal bug that's obviously what's completely incapacitated him.

"Bucky, can you hear me?" Tony says to him. "It's Sam and Tony. We're right here and we're going to get you out of this, okay? Just hold on." Tony's snatching things out of his suit from compartments Sam didn't even know were there. Sam recognizes the multi-tool, but the other stuff is so alien to him it could've come from Asgard. "You may have to hold him down." Tony says.

Sam nods then ditches his wings and goes to Bucky's other side. He puts his hands on Bucky's shoulders and does his best to keep him still without having to put any weight on him. "There's some kind of robot attached to Bucky's arm. It's hurting him somehow but we're getting it off," he says into the demands for information over the radio.

Bucky's not screaming anymore, but Sam's sure it's because he can't breathe well enough. His blue eyes are wide and wild but he's not looking at anything.

"It's okay, you're going to be all right," Sam says. Bucky doesn't react.

"Okay, here we go." Tony's pretty much just talking to himself. He touches one of his very unfamiliar tools to the robot, presses a button and a crackle of electric blue light flashes over the bug. The rounded back splits down the center and Tony makes a little pleased 'a-ha!' noise. He drops the Asgard thing and swipes up his multi-tool, then leans so close to the little bug he's practically grazing it with his nose. Then Bucky nearly breaks Tony's face for him when he arches through another surge of pain. "Hold him down!" Tony says.

Sam leans a little on Bucky's shoulder. "Sorry." He doesn't think Bucky can hear him.

"Great." Tony eases his multi-tool inside the bug and twists. But instead of it going dead or dropping off Bucky's arm, the bug whips out a tendril thin as a strand of hair and latches onto Tony's gauntlet. Then it reels itself onto his arm. "Uh-oh."

Bucky goes limp like he's just _died_ , but now Tony's saying, "shit, shit, shit," and kind of rolling on the rooftop as he tries to get the bug off his arm. He grabs at it but it shoots out a second filament and traps Tony's left hand against his right. "Fuck!" he yelps, then, "Owowowowow!" obviously in pain, but Sam has no idea what the little robot's doing.

Then Tony's eyes widen and he yells, "J.A.R.V.I.S—!" But the lights flickering around his gauntlets go out. Then Tony falls back and starts screaming just as loudly as Bucky did.

"I am attempting to shut down the armor, but the robot is overriding," J.A.R.V.I.S. says, and meanwhile Tony sounds like he's in hell.

Sam dives for Tony and tries to yank the fucking thing off him with his hands, but he can't budge it. He grabs his Steyr pistol to shoot it, but even at point-blank range like this, Tony's moving so much Sam's frightened he's going to hit him in the head.

Then Bucky's there, wrapping his arms around Tony's head and using his own body to both protect him and hold him down, and Sam shoots the bug about two hundred times. It's nothing but a smoking little stub of wires when Bucky grabs it and throws it away. It skids across the roof and topples over the side.

Bucky doesn't get off Tony as much as shove away from him to roll heavily onto his back. They both lay there, chests heaving.

"Well, that sucked," Tony rasps.

Bucky wheezes into a weak laugh, and then Tony starts laughing, and for some reason that makes Bucky laugh harder, until he grimaces and wraps his arms over his stomach.

"Ow. Ow. Fuck, don't make me laugh," Bucky says, which of course just makes Tony laugh more and that starts Bucky laughing again.

Sam blinks at both of them. He can't help smirking a little too, but even if they're both high on endorphins that doesn't mean they're all right. Unless this isn't endorphins. "That thing didn't drug you, did it?"

"I wish," Tony says. And _that_ is apparently the funniest thing anyone's ever said ever, going by the hilarity interspersed with Bucky's fervent swearing.

Sam reports back to the team that both Bucky and Tony are alive and mostly well, though he might need help getting them off the roof. And maybe to a hospital.

Nat replies as cool and steady as always, but he can still hear the depth of relief in her voice. She tells him that Steve's also going to be fine, and that he's on his way back to Avengers Tower. Sam's about to ask her what happened to the hospital, when he remembers Tony going on about his fully-staffed medical suite. Turns out that includes an MRI scanner for Steve's head and an operating theater ready to sew his leg back together. Convenient.

Clint's still with Steve, though he admits he took Steve's radio away out of self-preservation. But he promises to let him know Bucky and Tony are fine.

Thor offers to help with the heavy lifting and Sam promises he'll let him know. Neither Thor, Clint nor Natasha seem terribly surprised that Tony and Bucky are killing themselves laughing in the background. Sam finds that surprisingly reassuring.

"Howard, ease up before I croak," Bucky gasps. "Fuck. I feel like I've been on a three-day bender." He looks over at Sam with what seems like a lot of effort. "What the hell happened?"

"Well, you just called me Howard, Mr. Barnes," Tony says. His smile's even weaker, this side of angry. He hates it when Bucky calls him 'Howard'. "Hi. I'm Tony Stark. Somewhat-less-than-beloved offspring off Howard Stark, though way better looking. You may have heard of me, considering we've been on the same team for, oh, about a year?"

" _Sergeant_ Barnes," Bucky says pointedly. He lifts his hand to shake, mouth quirked apologetically. "Pleased to meet ya, Tony. That's some pretty sweet armor you got there."

Tony lifts up enough to blink at Bucky's hand, then just rolls his eyes and flops down again. "Thanks," he says dryly. "Yeah, It's peachy-keen. Killer-diller, even." He makes a lethargic peace sign. "Buy war bonds."

"Do you remember what happened?" Sam asks Bucky.

Bucky blinks at him. "You're not Gabe." He's not smiling anymore. It's completely dark now; the only real light is coming from the reactor in Tony's suit, casting everything in a kind of washed-out blue. Bucky's pale eyes look frosted over and alien.

"My name's Sam," Sam tells him, slow and calm. Nothing like the way his heart is suddenly rattling in his chest. "Sam Wilson. We met a little over a year ago. Do you remember?"

"Yeah. Sure." Bucky nods slowly, like things are clicking back into place. His mouth quirks up a little. "The coffee guy." He looks at Tony. "You're Iron Man. I call you 'Howard' sometimes to piss you off. And I'm…" He stops, and in the light it's impossible to tell what emotion flickers through his eyes. "I'm the Winter Soldier."

"Got it in one," Tony says. He grimaces as he levers himself off his back so he's sitting. "Now for the bonus question: do you remember how you got here?"

Bucky lifts his left arm, turning it back and forth like he's examining it in the light. It doesn't look like it's moving properly, but it's hard to tell. "I fell." 

"You mean, when he stuck you with Hell's electronic ladybug?" Tony says.

Bucky looks at Tony, then he gives his head a quick shake. "Yeah. I mean, after. Before, I was chasing someone with two metal arms."

"Do you remember why?" Sam asks.

"Sure." Bucky nods. "The son of a bitch hurt Steve." Suddenly he sucks in a breath, then bolts up so that he's on his knees, though it's obvious by his face how much it hurts. "Steve! Is he all right?"

"He's fine," Sam says quickly. "He's fine. He needs an operation to fix his leg, and the docs will need to make sure his head's okay, but he's going to be fine."

"I want to see him," Bucky says. He climbs painfully to his feet, leaning heavily on the cupola just behind him.

Sam stands up too, moves closer to Bucky in case he has to steady him. "Of course. But you need to take it easy. You're body just went through a hell of a lot of stress."

Bucky nods, arms wrapped around his torso. His left arm definitely isn't working right. "I'm just sore," he says. "I've had worse."

"You've had worse," Tony parrots numbly. He was putting his tools away but now he's stopped dead, staring. "You've had _worse?_ That thing was on me for, like, thirty seconds and I would've gleefully gnawed my arm off to make it stop. What the hell happened to you that was _worse?_ " Tony's eyes are wide with horror, glistening like black water in the dark.

Bucky shrugs, but if anything he holds himself more tightly. "They used the chair for punishment, sometimes. Whichever buncha' assholes had my chain. Like that, I mean." He jerks his chin a little towards Tony, Tony's arm where the robot latched onto him. "That kind of electricity stuff."

"Jesus," Tony says, still just as wide-eyed, staring up at Bucky. "For how long?"

Sam can see Bucky swallowing. "'Few hours, depending on how sorry they wanted me to be." His voice is gravelly, but then he lifts his chin and straightens his shoulders, drops his hands into fists at his sides. "Don't matter. I'm alive and they ain't, and that's all I care about. That and getting off this fucking roof so I can see Steve."

Tony visibly yanks himself back from whatever awful place his mind went. "Yeah, sure. Good idea." He shoves his tools away into his armor, then twitches his fingers and his gloves fly back onto his hands. He stares mournfully at his helmet until Sam picks it up and hands it to him.

Tony puts the helmet on with the facemask up, and his armor glows blue along the joints as it powers up again. Tony's sigh of relief is audible as J.A.R.V.I.S. takes some of the effort of getting him to his feet. "No offense, Buckaroo, but you don't look like you could get off a mattress by yourself right now." He takes a step closer, spreads his arms. "What do you say, princess? Your chariot awaits."

Bucky scrubs his face with his right hand. "I think I'd rather jump." But he looks up grinning, even if it's obvious he's embarrassed as hell. "All right, Honey. Fly me to the sidewalk."

"Oh my God." Tony looks at Sam in mock amazement. "Did he just use a pop culture reference from after 1945?" He turns back to Bucky. "I'm so proud. At this rate we'll get you quoting _The Simpsons_ by the time you're 130."

Bucky smirks. "Eat my shorts, dickwad."

"Did you hear that, Sammy? Our little baby's becoming a man." Tony pretends to wipe a tear, then flips his facemask down. He spreads his arms again. "Hop up, sweetheart. You know the drill, arms around my neck. Don't choke me or I'll drop you."

"Jackass," Bucky says, but he slings his arms around Tony's neck and endures the bridal carry down to the sidewalk.

Sam grabs his wing harness and tugs it back on, wincing as it rubs against the burns he'd completely forgotten. He makes another mental note to tell Tony.

He sees Bucky's goggles when he turns on his harnesses' built-in light. One of the lenses is cracked, but Sam puts it around his neck anyway to bring back to him. They still remind him unpleasantly of the ones Bucky wore over his facemask when he was Hydra's Asset. Sam only got a glimpse of him in that getup, but he can still remember how frightening Bucky looked like that, more like a machine than a person. A clearly deliberate choice of Hydra to intimidate their targets as well as conceal their assassin.

The man who nearly killed Steve and Bucky tonight looked eerily similar to the way Bucky did, when he was still a weapon who didn't remember he'd ever been a man.

"Hey, Sam! You coming or what?" Bucky shouts at him from the street.

He leans far enough over the edge of the roof so Tony and Bucky can see him. "Sorry. Just thinking. Bucky, did that guy you were after have a facemask?"

"Yeah. He ditched it about twenty roofs back."

"Thanks." Sam looks in the direction Bucky and the assassin were running from, but it's too dark to see anything. And right now his priority is getting Bucky and Tony back to the tower. He's especially concerned about Bucky, who Sam is sure is in way worse shape than he's letting on.

All the Avengers ignore their limitations. Even Sam, though at least he's aware it's a bad idea when he does it. But it's a toss-up between Natasha, Bucky and Clint who's the worst. Steve soldiers on because before the serum he had no choice, and after because he still thinks he doesn't. Bruce will quietly work himself to death trying to assuage his guilt over what the Hulk's done. Tony constantly pushes himself past his endurance because it's the only way to get his brain to shut up. And Thor is a warrior prince whose ideal fate is to die in battle.

But Natasha, Bucky and Clint were brutally punished for reacting normally to pain.

Sam thinks he's glad it's only Bucky who got injured of the three of them as he jumps lightly to the street. Needing to wrangle Clint and Natasha too would be hell. "We'll need to come back for it," he says. "We might be able to use it to track him." He hits the button that folds his wings tightly to his back. They'd fit nicely under a trench coat like this, if he had one, but at least they won't get in the way.

"Way ahead of you, Sherlock," Tony says. He points at his ear, buried under his suit helmet though he's put the faceplate up again. "My special friends at S.H.I.E.L.D. redux are on it like cute on a kitten. They're coming in their super-stealthy talking SUVS even as we speak."

"Swell," Bucky says. "Can they give us a ride?" The fact that he's even willing to ask shows just how tired he is and in how much pain. A year ago he wouldn't have said anything at all, though, so it's still progress, Sam figures. Even if it's miserably obvious how hard Bucky's trying not to hobble.

Sam sighs inwardly, then goes over to him and lifts Bucky's left arm across his shoulders. "I know you can make it on your own," he says quietly to him, "but you don't have to."

Bucky doesn't entirely freeze up, but it does take him a second to start moving again. "Yeah, okay," he says.

Tony scoffs at Bucky's question, then winces. "Ow. Believe me, Elsa, the last thing you want is to owe Coulson any favors. I can have a car sent for us." He's hobbling as well, despite J.A.R.V.I.S.'s help. "But I'm thinking taxi. It'll be faster."

"Dressed like this?" Sam says.

"It's New York," Tony responds easily. "They won't even notice."

Bucky smirks, then winces just like Tony did. "Some things never change." He and Tony share a grin. 

Tony stops walking and his suit unfolds off him and then refolds into a suitcase. Tony looks instantly even more miserable without the suit, but he gamely picks up the case of armor and limps along with them.

"Maybe you should fly back and meet us at the tower?" Sam says.

The look Tony gives him somehow manages to be both wistful and withering. "I may not be Captain Awesome, but I can get to the corner to hail a fucking taxi."

"Can you even lift your arm?" Sam asks mildly.

Tony actually tries, before he drops his free arm and winces. "Fine. You can hail the fucking taxi."

"Don't make me laugh," Bucky says.

* * *

Steve is still in surgery by the time they get back to the tower, though J.A.R.V.I.S. says he's going to be back to his usual amount of red with the white and blue in no time. Tony can totally get behind that. Bleeding out on the pavement isn't a good look for anyone.

Tony still feels like hell in a handbag, but Stark Industries has access to some pretty awesome experimental painkillers, and he helps himself to a couple as soon as he and Bucky stumble into his workshop. They'd go down even better with a couple fingers of whisky, but Tony's trying to be all responsible and shit these days. He just has three glasses of water instead.

He tosses the pill bottle at Bucky, but Bucky's looking at everything like he's never seen the place and turns his back in time for the bottle to bounce off his shoulder blade and onto the floor. Bucky startles and whips around like Tony threw a grenade at him, which would be hilarious if he didn't also snatch the nearest screwdriver off the workbench and almost-but-not-quite come charging at Tony with murder in his eyes. What's even less hilarious is that Tony's a little too certain that the only thing that stopped the Buck there was him being in too much pain to follow through before the reality check cashed.

"Whoa! Whoa. Chill out, Mad Max. It's just me." He juts his chin at the bottle on the floor so he can keep his hands up with the palms facing out in the universal gesture of 'please don't kill me'. "Those are painkillers, that's all. I thought you could use a couple. You know, to kill the pain."

"Oh," Bucky says. He smiles sheepishly and puts the screwdriver down. "Sorry. Guess I'm still a little edgy."

"No shit."

Just then, of course, Dum-E decides it's the perfect time to come charging over to pick the bottle up. Naturally he runs over it instead.

"God, why do I even bother to recharge you? Go. Yeah, over there. Go do something less destructive. No, I don't want a smoothie. Shoo." 

Dum-E beeps disconsolately at Tony and trundles off with his claw face all but touching the floor, the drama queen.

Bucky frowns as he watches Dum-E wedging himself into a far corner. "He looks like a dog you just kicked."

Tony shrugs (ow), determined not to feel guilty. "Tough love. He's used to it." The pill bottle is a very, very long way away. They both just look at it. Tony takes a breath. "Hey, Dum-E." And yeah, the way the robot perks up at his name is just way too artful, the little con artist. Bucky is obviously a soft touch and Tony shouldn't let that influence him. He points at the pills. "If you can actually give those to Bucky without dropping the bottle or crushing it _again_ , all will be forgiven."

Dum-E rushes over, then stops about ten feet away from the bottle. He lurches the rest of the distance in painful inches, then plucks the bottle off the floor like it's a soap bubble or something and lifts it so slowly that finally Tony just grabs it out of his claw. " _Thank you._ Yes, that was marvelous. You're the best robot ever. Sure, you can get Bucky a smoothie. He'd love one."

Tony smiles at Bucky as he hands him the pill bottle. "It might have motor oil in it, but you should drink it anyway." He blinks innocently. "You don't want to hurt his feelings."

Bucky just blinks back at him a couple times like he's deciding where to hide the body, then actually looks at the bottle. "These won't make me high, will they?"

"Not unless you take, like, eight of them at once. Which I'm not saying I did on the grounds that I refuse to incriminate myself." Tony taps the bottle's directions. "Two is a standard dose. I'd recommend four, because you're a super soldier and will probably burn through two in five minutes. And you were all writhy and screamy way longer than I was and, you know, I would've gleefully gnawed my arm off." He lifts his arm an inch and mimes chewing it. "But I know you're only going to take two anyway, so I won't."

"Thanks." Bucky smirks, then opens the bottle with his teeth and shakes two into his hand. It takes him a moment to find the sink (and if he's that tired, no wonder he almost went Michael Myers on Tony's ass), then swallows the pills and chugs another four glasses of water. He's only using his right hand, like his left one is annoying him so much he's decided to just ignore it.

"Great." Tony claps his hands then wishes he hadn't, since the pills haven't quite kicked in yet. "Now that you're hydrated and doped up—kidding!" he adds quickly at Bucky's momentary flash of panic. "Now that you're hydrated and have taken no more than the recommended dose of soon-to-be-FDA-approved painkillers," he amends carefully, "why don't you come over here so I can fix that southpaw of yours?"

Bucky looks down at his left arm like he's seriously forgotten he has one. It's hanging a little weird, like the forearm's over-rotated. Tony's very glad that the prosthetic was designed to be tactile but not to feel pain, because he's sure an injury like that would hurt like hell. Bucky shrugs his right shoulder when he looks up at Tony again. His smile's lopsided. "How 'bout you just cut it off?"

Tony grimaces. "Uh, no. How 'bout I not rip open your brachial artery and have to explain to Cap why his boyfriend bled to death all over my workshop?" He taps Bucky's shoulder, right in the middle of the nifty shield tattoo. "Best I can do is replace the arm, which is awesome enough, believe me. Anything to do with removing the housing is going to require surgery." He lifts his eyebrows. "Is there a problem with the housing or something? Are you in pain? 'Cause I can check…"

"Naw, it doesn't hurt." Bucky shakes his head. He rolls his shoulder and winces. "It just…doesn't feel right."

"That I can fix," Tony says with authority. "Can you put your am on the table?" He sits on the stool next to Bucky. "I need to pick it up to examine it," he says, then waits for Bucky's nod. He lifts the arm carefully, turning it and bending the joints, feeling for hot spots under the metal or places where the segments don't join properly. "I'm pretty sure the robot fried some of the circuits," he says, after asking Bucky to move his hand and the fingers a few times. "I can repair this one, if you want, or I can remove it and give you a new one." He grins. "The new one's fucking amazing. But don't let that influence your decision, or anything."

"'Course not," Bucky says, though his smile almost curves up at both sides. "Sure. What the hell. Let's see the new arm."

"Hey, with that kind of enthusiasm, how can I refuse?" Tony rolls his eyes as he gets up and goes to the extremely well-locked cabinet where he keeps all of the potential arm designs. Basically, engineering Bucky new and improved left arms is Tony's new favorite hobby when he's not working on new armor or wings for Sam or making Clint and Natasha groovier weaponry. Most of the designs don't get out of the holographic stage, but this one Tony's pretty proud of.

He turns around, about to show the arm off with a flourish, but his mouth snaps shut when he sees that Bucky's eyes are closed and he's rubbing his temple like he's got one hell of a headache. His face looks practically grey in the artificial light, like Tony would seriously not be surprised if he keeled over.

"Are you okay? 'Cause you look like you're about to drop dead. Either that or you have a migraine, which according to Pepper is about the same thing."

Bucky doesn't change position except to shake his head. "Just tired," he says. "And I'd fucking kill for a cigarette."

Tony stops, considering. "J.A.R.V.I.S., please confirm for me that Pepper's not going to be back in the country for three more days."

"That is correct, sir," J.A.R.V.I.S. says. "Am I to surmise that you are about to do something you would rather she not know about?"

"Got it in one, J." Tony puts the arm down on the table and goes back to the cabinet. He finds the barely-touched pack of Gauloises he bought the last time he was in Paris and that he will insist to his grave are not actually hidden at the absolute back of a shelf behind piles of dangerous-looking junk, and brings them to the table. "J.A.R.V.I.S., standard Pepper Isn't Here Protocol, please."

"Of course, sir." And Tony would swear the A.I. sounds resigned. "I will erase any reference to you finding yet another means to poison yourself from my memory. Though you may wish to make sure you adequately air out the workshop this time."

"Good idea. Thanks, J." Tony grabs a cigarette out of the pack then tosses it onto the table so that it skids into Bucky's elbow. "Smoke 'em while you got 'em."

It's kind of pathetic, the way Bucky perks up at the idea of giving himself cancer. "Hey, Gauloises!" He lifts the pack and pulls a cigarette out with his teeth, then looks expectantly at Tony. "Gotta light?"

"Yup." Tony lights his cigarette with the butane torch on the other end of the long table, then holds the torch for Bucky, who gets the end of his cigarette glowing nicely without catching his hair on fire. Tony shuts the torch off, then sits back on the stool and takes a moment to just enjoy the thick, acid burn of the smoke in his lungs. "I think it's been at least a year since I had one of these. I only smoke when I drink, and I haven't been drinking, so…"

Bucky grunts in commiseration, and blows smoke out of the side of his mouth. "Steve smoked like a fucking chimney when we were going after Hydra. But he wouldn't whenever we were being filmed." He grins. "He wouldn't let any of us light up, either. Said he didn't want to make it look glamorous for the kiddies."

Tony smirks, then accidentally sucks in a lungful and tries to talk at the same time, and ends up doubled over, coughing. "Surprised he knew it was bad for you," he wheezes finally, wiping his eyes.

Bucky shrugs with just his right shoulder again. "Before the serum, he couldn't even be near a cigarette without hacking his lungs up. Guess he never forgot it." He sucks in more smoke, then takes the cigarette out of his mouth and looks at it. "Dernier got me into these. The crazy frog smokes at least two packs a day, when he can get 'em. It amazes me that Hydra hasn't just followed his trail of butts and nailed us all by now." He smiles in a way that would be entirely fond and much less creepy if he hadn't started talking about someone Tony knows is long dead as if he'd just spoken to the guy two minutes ago when they'd set up camp for the night.

Tony swallows. "Uh, Bucky?" He doesn't exactly know what to say when Bucky looks at him with shadowed blue eyes that meet Tony's own and yet don't seem to be focused anywhere near him. He's pretty sure that blurting, 'you're buddy Jacques Dernier is dead' wouldn't be a good choice, though. So he goes with, "you okay?" and hopes to hell that Bucky hasn't fallen so far down the rabbit hole in his head that he won't be able to climb back out.

Bucky blinks and blinks again while the cigarette burns. And then he kind of shakes himself, glances at the red cone advancing on his fingers and stubs the butt out on the work table. "He's dead. They're all dead. 'Cept for Steve and me," he says bluntly. Tony has a bad feeling that he's reminding himself.

"Yeah," Tony says, and the roughness in his throat has nothing to do with the smoke polluting his lungs. He swallows down the 'I'm sorry', because Bucky has to know that by now and what the hell good would it do anyway? Everyone Tony knows has lost people; words and sympathy never bring them back. And Bucky's not the type for sympathy anyway. So instead, Tony stubs out his own cigarette—it's no fun anymore—and picks up Bucky's new arm. "So," he says, trying to make his voice lighter, get them both back to where they just need painkillers and a few hours' sleep and everything will be fine. "Ready to find out what your new wing can do?"

Bucky tries something on almost like another smile, but he shakes his head. "Sorry, pal, but I'm beat. I gotta get my head down."

"Oh, sure," Tony says. He tries to hide his disappointment, especially since if anything Bucky looks worse than he did a few minutes ago: pale and shaky like he's scraping the bottom of his endurance. He stands up when Bucky does, mostly to grab him if he passes out.

"Thanks for the cigarette," Bucky says, and at least his smile's slightly less wan.

"Here." Tony scoops the rest of the pack off the table and slaps it into Bucky's hand. "You might as well take it. Like I said, I haven't smoked in a year or something. And, you know." Tony gestures vaguely at Bucky's chest. "You've got the super soldier healing thing going on anyway, so you probably won't get cancer nearly as quickly as I would."

Bucky grins at the pack. "Thanks," he says, sounding far more grateful than Tony thinks he should for such a little thing. "Sorry to ditch you like this. You can put the new arm on and show me all the bells and whistles tomorrow, all right? I just really need some shuteye."

"Yeah, sure." Tony nods, a little mollified. "I should get some sleep, too." After he calls Pepper so she can hear he and everyone else are all right before she watches the News. But she's in Zurich and won't be awake for another hour. He walks Bucky to the workshop door, trying to be all casual while ready to grab him. 

Bucky gets there under his own steam, and the look he gives Tony says he knows exactly what Tony's doing. But he shoves the cigarettes into one of his many uniform pockets and claps Tony on the shoulder. "Thanks, Tony," he says. "You're a good friend."

"Oh." Tony blinks, surprised. He bites back the automatic self-depreciation and says, "Thanks," despite how it feels disingenuous as hell to just accept it. Tony knows he's not a good friend, never has been. Yinsen's unburied ashes are testament to that, if the whole rest of Tony's life wasn't already evidence enough.

But Sam Wilson _is_ a good friend. And one thing Sam's taught him is that when someone gives you a compliment, just fucking take it. So Tony does. And he's not nearly humble enough not to feel pleased with himself at Bucky's smile. Nice to know he did the right thing, for once. 

"You too, by the way," Tony adds, hoping it's not too tagged on for Bucky to believe it. "Really. You, uh, I'm glad you're part of the team. And I don't think I've said that to anyone else ever. So, uh, you know I mean it."

"Sure," Bucky says. Now he's grinning like he thinks Tony's an idiot. "Don't get all soppy on me now. I don't want you to start crying or nothing."

Tony snorts. "Screw you, Frosty."

Bucky just rolls his eyes and shakes his head. "Yeah, yeah. You're such a sweetheart." He walks towards the elevators, looking slightly less zombie-like. He lifts his hand in a half-assed wave over his shoulder. "Night, Howard."

"Funny! That's really funny, Buchanan!" Tony hurls after him.

He's still grinding his teeth when he hears, "Sergeant Barnes!" before the elevator doors close.

* * *

Bucky waits until he's safely hidden inside the elevator, then leans heavily against the wall with his knees locked so he doesn't end up on his ass on the floor. His head is fucking _killing_ him, has been since Hydra's newest toy nailed him on the roof. His whole body hurts, left shoulder especially, but his head is like someone shoved a white-hot branding iron between his eyes. He's just glad it's not bad enough for the kid to take over.

He wanted to just take four of the damn pills like Tony said, considering two didn't do anything for him at all. But he didn't know what that many would do, and he needs to be sharp, stay in control.

He wipes the sweat off his forehead with the heel of his hand, then checks that there's no one in front of the elevator before he gets out on the floor he shares with Steve. No one should be there, since Steve's recovering from the surgery on his leg down in the medical suite, but you can't be too careful. But Bucky's alone.

Bucky yanks the radio out of his ear and shoves it into one of the pouches on his belt. It's a major hassle getting out of the armor one-handed, but he's done it before, even if it's normally his right arm that's fucked up. 

He knows that's not his memory.

He _hates_ that, but he'll use it. Just like he used all the other memories that aren't his to understand what the hell Tony and Sam were talking about. It's hard, though. Maybe that's one of the reasons his head hurts so much. He feels like he's been playing catch-up ball all night, ever since he got that machine slapped on his arm.

_Not my arm._

Yeah. Bucky glances down at it, hanging uselessly at his side. It gleams in the light like one of the instruments Zola—

Just looking at the thing makes him sick with revulsion.

He takes his boots and socks off, leaves them strewn behind him with his armor and shirt. He keeps the pack of cigarettes, though, pulls another one while he goes into the kitchen. The whole place is swankier than anything he's ever been in. He's not used to this kind of luxury. It makes him edgy. He wonders how Steve can handle it.

At least there's a box of matches in one of the drawers. He lights up and that's a little better, the familiar heat and taste of tobacco smoke over his tongue. He leaves the pack on the counter. Maybe Steve will want one when he gets back.

"Hey, J.A.R.V.I.S., when is Steve gonna be ready for visitors?"

"Not until the morning, I'm afraid," the robot voice says. "I could request a more precise timeframe, if you like."

"Naw, that's okay, thanks." He takes a long drag on the cigarette, exhales out the side of his mouth as he pads out of the kitchen on bare feet. The combat knife's in the drawer next to his side of the bed just like he remembers leaving it, except for how it wasn't actually him. But all that matters is that it's long and sharp and the weight is right and balanced in his hand. He flips it around a few times, getting the feel of it. It'll do.

The bathroom is tiled in some kind of smooth grey stone and just as swank as the rest of the apartment. The shower's so big Bucky figures half the 107th could've fit in there with room left over. It's as good a place as any.

He goes in and sits with his back against the wall, flipping the knife in his hand. The tile's cool against his skin and makes a scraping sound when the metal of the arm slides against it. Bucky glances up, then scowls around the cigarette at the little boy who's standing in the far corner of the room. "Come on outta there already. You're like How—shit—like Tony's robot. I'm not gonna beat you."

"Do you require assistance?"

"Jesus! Don't do that," Bucky snaps at the ceiling. "I'm fine. I don't require anything, thanks. Can you do me a favor and scram? I thought you weren't supposed to nose around our homes anyway."

"As you say, sir. I beg your pardon. I thought you were speaking to me."

"Don't worry about it. Just, go away. Please," he adds, mostly because of the way the kid is looking at him.

"Of course, sir. Going away now."

"Great," Bucky mutters. The kid has maybe inched two steps closer to him. "Quit looking at me like that. You know I gotta do this."

The little boy shakes his head, messy brown hair flopping all over the place. His blue eyes are huge. "Don't. Don't. It'll hurt."

"Yeah, I know." Bucky takes another drag on the cigarette, knows he's just stalling. "I'm sorry about that. I'll make it quick as I can, okay?"

The kid just shakes his head again. "I want Bucky."

Bucky glares. "I'm right here, you little booger."

Now the kid looks angry. "Not you. The real one."

Well, two can play that game. "I am the real Bucky. You know that as fucking well as I do. Who the hell kept you two alive after…" Damn it, but it still feels like a snake in his guts just saying the name out loud. He swallows. "After Zola got his hooks into us, huh? Who made sure Steve's crazy ideas didn't get us all killed? That sure as fuck wasn't _Bucky._ That was Sergeant Barnes. That was _me._ "

The kid's little hands are in fists and he's so mad now he's shaking. "I don't want you! I want Bucky! You shouldn't be here! You died! _You fell and you died!_ "

"Yeah, well, I'm here now, ain't I?" Sergeant Barnes snarls, cigarette clenched between his teeth. Then he flips the knife around one more time, and plunges it into his left shoulder where his body's attached to that fucking left arm.


	2. Chapter 2

Sam comes out of the bathroom and is very glad for the towel he has wrapped around his waist when he sees that Natasha isn't alone in their living room. She's sitting next to Clint, both their heads bent close together as they look at something on her Starktab. Phil Coulson is standing on the other side of the table, impeccably dressed as always, with his arms crossed in that way he has of looking like he can wait forever if he has to but he'd really rather not.

Sam's sure everyone heard him, but Phil is the only one who gives him a nod with something close to a smile to go with it. He's not happy, that much is obvious. Then again, none of them are after the day they've had. Almost losing a friend will do that to you.

Sam gives Phil a quick nod in return and beats it into the bedroom. He allows himself a sigh because it has been a hell of a day and he was looking forward to going to bed, preferably with Natasha, and now he's got a S.H.I.E.L.D. meeting going on in his living room. Sam isn't S.H.I.E.L.D. and he supposes he could actually use that as an excuse to hide in the bedroom. But he is an Avenger and he likes to think he's an adult, so he sucks it up, throws on some clean clothes—getting the tee-shirt on hurts his back a bit, but the burn isn't too bad—and goes to find out what's so fascinating that Nat didn't even glance at him.

"Hey, Sam," Clint says, looking up. "Come check this out. It's disgusting."

Natasha lifts one of her hands in a vague greeting, though she doesn't move her eyes from the pictures she's scrolling through.

Phil shakes Sam's hand, then pulls something out of his breast pocket and gives it to him. "Welcome to S.H.I.E.L.D.," he says as Sam flips the wallet open and looks at the badge inside. 

Sam recognizes the stylized eagle logo, though the overly-long name is more squished around the top half of the circle, to make room for "Reserves" at the bottom. He looks up, blinking. "Did I just join S.H.I.E.L.D.?"

Phil gives a kind of shrug. He looks a little shy. "Well, since I've been tasked with rebuilding, I decided I can choose to waive entrance requirements for specific individuals. So, welcome to the brand-new S.H.I.E.L.D. Reserves, Agent Wilson."

Sam looks at the badge again, then back at Phil. "Thank you," he says. "But, like I told Fury, I'm a soldier, not a spy."

"S.H.I.E.L.D. had plenty of spies," Phil says. "I think that maybe this time we should have more soldiers."

"And scientists," Natasha adds. "Bruce got one too." She glances up at Sam, gives him one of her small, precious smiles. "I recommended you."

"Oh. Well. Guess I can't refuse then."

"Nope." She grins, then pats the couch next to her. "Come here. Take a look at this."

"Sure." Sam sits next to her and dutifully picks up the Starktab. He smirks. "I have to admit I was thinking you'd just want me to make coffee. I don't know how I can help with any of this."

"A new pair of eyes is always good," Phil says, though he sounds like he's not expecting much. "We're trying to find anything that will confirm that these new centipede soldiers are actually a harbinger of a new Hydra faction, or if this is another group who were able to get their hands on the serum formula."

"Basically, none of us think that the scary dude with the metal arms and Hydra tats just happened to decide to blow Captain America's head off today while a bunch of jacked-up assholes took out random parts of the city," Clint puts in.

"But, they may be two different groups working together. Or two different Hydra factions," Natasha says.

"Or it's possible that Hydra was taking advantage of a completely unrelated series of attacks by a group with a different agenda entirely. Or that Hydra isn't involved at all, and whomever really _is_ just wants us to blame Hydra," Phil says. His mouth quirks when Sam glances up at him. "We're trying to narrow it down."

"Right." Sam starts scrolling through the pictures. They look like they were taken by crime scene examiners, though he can see S.H.I.E.L.D. SUVs in some of the backgrounds. It makes him smile a little, remembering Tony's adamant refusal to ask any of Coulson's agents for a ride.

A lot of the pictures really are disgusting. Like the centipede super soldiers missing parts of their heads from Bucky's sniper bullets, or the smoking, blackened bodies fried by Thor, or the twisted, red-soaked messes left by the Hulk. Sam looks up again. "Bruce isn't going to see any of these, is he?"

"No way in hell," Clint says succinctly.

"They deserved it. It was kinder than what they did," Natasha says, and Sam knows by her voice that she'll refuse to tell him about it, just like she knows he's going to ask anyway. And keep asking until she shares a little bit of the burden.

For now, he puts his arm around her. She almost leans into him.

"Excuse me, sirs, madam." J.A.R.V.I.S.'s mechanical voice is as cultured as ever, but Sam can hear the slight tension. He stopped wondering a while ago if the building's A.I. had emotions or not and just went with it. And he can tell J.A.R.V.I.S. is worried. "I'm terribly sorry to intrude, but I believe that Sergeant Barnes may be in need of assistance."

Instantly the four of them are looking up at the ceiling. "What do you mean?" Natasha asks first.

Clint frowns. "I thought our places were off limits unless we ask for you."

"They are." J.A.R.V.I.S. sounds apologetic. "And I assure you that any voyeurism was unintended. I normally would have had no sensors operating on a residential floor unless specifically requested to do so. But I thought Sergeant Barnes was speaking to me, so I made myself present in order to reply. But it became clear immediately that he was conversing with someone else. However, he is the only person in the apartment. I fear he may be hallucinating."

"Maybe he was just on his radio?" Clint suggests hopefully.

"I don't believe so. He gave every appearance of taking part in a direct conversation."

Sam stands up and Clint and Natasha get to their feet as well. "It might be nothing. Sometimes people just talk out loud," Sam says.

"I am aware of that,"—and now Sam's sure he hears a touch of reproof in the A.I.'s voice—"but in this case Sergeant Barnes was clearly focused on a specific part of the room when he spoke. He instructed someone to come out of the corner, and he seemed to be expecting an actual response."

Natasha says, "Oh, my God," in Russian. Sam's heard it enough that he can recognize it.

"That's not good," Clint says.

Natasha puts her hand on his arm before Sam can move. "You're not going up there alone," she says. "We don't know what this is. It may be nothing, but if it's not, if he doesn't know where he is or recognize you…"

"I'm coming too," Clint says. He looks at Phil. "Hold the fort."

Phil's smile is somehow fond, wan and tolerant all at the same time. "Be safe," he says, and there's a wealth of meaning behind it.

"Says the man who died," Clint snorts.

"Hence my concern," Phil says, with the same smile.

"Should we call Tony?" Clint asks a minute later as the three of them are leaving Sam and Natasha's floor and going to the stairwell next to the elevator. "They're pretty close."

"Yeah, but we don't want to crowd him," Sam says. And while Tony has the best intentions, he also has a way of saying the absolute worst possible thing at the worst possible moment. Sam would like to avoid the potential fallout of that if he can.

They're moving quickly, almost at the landing for Steve and Bucky's floor when Natasha stops dead on the stairs. She tilts her head, listening, then her eyes go wide. "He's screaming."

They run.

J.A.R.V.I.S. opens the door for them before Sam has to use the number code, and then they all sprint to the back of the floor. Bucky's not screaming anymore, but the A.I. says he's still alive and tells them where they can find him.

Luckily the bathrooms are as palatial as all the other rooms in the tower, because in a regular apartment, with the way Bucky's sprawled they'd never get the door open.

The first thing Sam sees is the body and the blood, and the only thing in his head is the pulverized wrecks of the centipede soldiers after the Hulk got through with them. There's the remains of a pool of blood in the shower, and a wide horror-film trail of it over the floor where Bucky tried to get up and couldn't. He's more-or-less leaning against the side of the ridiculously large bathtub with his hand clutching his shoulder, more blood running over his fingers.

His face is absolutely white, and he's trembling like the first stages of shock.

"I'm sorry," he says. "I-I couldn't stop him."

Sam automatically goes to his knees next to Bucky, gratefully snatching the folded towel Natasha shoves at him to put pressure on the wound. "It's all right," he says. "We're here. You're going to be okay."

"J.A.R.V.I.S. has alerted the doctors; they're on their way," Natasha says to him, and Sam has never been more thankful for Tony's opulence, because it means medical help is just a few floors down. He's not sure if it's arterial blood emptying out of Bucky's shoulder, but there's a hell of a lot of it.

"What happened?" Clint's in the shower, picking something off the floor. Sam can see a cigarette butt and a knife, both bloody. Clint comes back out and looks around the room, especially the windows and ceiling, accessing how someone might've gotten in. Sam can't see anything.

Natasha wordlessly hands Sam another towel, which he puts on top of the first one. Bucky cries out, then clenches his jaw.

"I tried to stop him," Bucky says again, in response to Clint's question. "I t-told him not to do it." His breath shudders. "It hurts."

Natasha and Sam look at each other.

"James," Natasha says. And Sam's heart hits his throat when Bucky turns his head to her. "Who did you try to stop?"

"Sergeant Barnes," James says.

"You mean, Bucky," Clint says.

James shakes his head. "No. The other one. The one who came after. Sergeant Barnes."

That makes no sense at all, but neither does anything else here. Sam feels like he's stumbled into a nightmare, one he thought ended for good over a year ago. "Sergeant Barnes hurt you?"

"Not me," James says, "The Asset. He tried to kill the Asset."

* * *

"Got it!" Skye calls down from the roof of the aggressively tall building with the completely inadequate fire escape.

She sticks her flashlight in her mouth and totters down as carefully as possible with only one free hand, and proudly gives the facemask to Jemma Simmons. "One disgustingly sweat- and blood-covered creepy facemask, as requested."

"Oh, thank you." Jemma takes the mask with appreciative glee. She examines it closely with the special glowy goggles that practically give her x-ray vision and are one of Leo Fitz's many legacies. At least Jemma can use the tools he made for her without crying anymore, and she was actually still smiling after the last time she visited him.

He still hasn't woken up, though. Only Jemma still talks like he might.

"Hmm. Well, all this blood definitely supports our mystery assassin having a pneumothorax," Jemma says. "One of his lungs has a hole in it," she explains to Skye.

"Yeah." Skye nods. She points to her face. "This was my, 'ew, that is really gross and horrible', face. Not my 'I don't understand the term' face."

"Oh." Jemma squints at her. The green goggle lenses make her look like an alien raccoon. "Well, they're somewhat similar. Maybe if you actually frowned a bit—"

"So, what now?" Skye asks quickly, before Jemma ends up in a Kentucky Derby's worth of tangents. She gestures around the alley they're standing in, which is empty and echo-y and extremely dark, except for Jemma's goggles and their flashlights. "We have the mask, and I assume you found everything you're going to find with your cool goggles, right?"

"Full-spectrum, microscopic goggles," she corrects absently as she slides the mask into a plastic evidence bag. "And yes, aside from the blood drops I mentioned. And a rat." She gestures vaguely beside her, where Skye remembers Jemma excitedly pointing out blood spatter that she was sure fell from the Hydra assassin as he leapt across the gap between buildings. "I'll have to make sure they really do match the blood in the mask, of course, but that will have to wait until we're back at our temporary headquarters."

"Yeah," Skye sighs. She misses the Playground too, though it's not exactly close enough for an easy commute. Her phone vibrates and she assumes it's A.C. asking for an update, but then she looks at the screen and her eyes widen in surprise before she grins. "Hey, Mike's here!"

"Mike?" Jemma looks up from depositing the evidence bag in her backpack, peeling off her vinyl gloves. "You mean, Mike Peterson?"

Skye nods. "Look." She turns her phone around so Jemma can see the little orange dot on the map. "He's, like…okay, several blocks away from here. Like, right on the edge of this thing's tracking range. But he's in New York." She taps the dot. "That's him."

Jemma squints at the dot like it's the rat. "How do you know it's Mike?" She looks at Skye, glowy raccoon eyes wide behind the goggles. "And why are you tracking him?"

"Ah, well, I'm not _tracking_ him, tracking him. I'm just…" Skye shrugs. "Good at finding out where he is? He just took off!" Skye blurts at Jemma's silence. "He left his kid and went on this stupid redemption quest, and, I figure that what happened to him is as much S.H.I.E.L.D.'s fault as Hydra's. So." She spreads her hands. "I just figured, if I knew where he was, I could check up on him every so often. Just, make sure he's all right."

"That's rather sweet, actually," Jemma says. She gives Skye one of her brilliant smiles before she looks at the screen again. "It makes sense he'd be here now, if he's on a 'redemption quest' as you say." She frowns. "Are you quite sure it's him? I thought you could access his hardware. This seems rather, ah, vague."

"It's also way less invasive. And voyeuristic. And gross." Skye points at the little dot. "The all- access pass thing was because I needed to be able to communicate with him. But he's had enough people in his head. He deserves some peace, you know?"

Jemma nods. "I think he'd appreciate that."

Skye smiles, a little guiltily. "He'd probably appreciate me butting out entirely a lot more. But…" She shrugs. "I know what it's like to not have anyone care about what happens to you. So, this way it's more like, me checking out his Facebook page instead of cyberstalking him. I adapted the program so that it just tracks—I mean, um, finds—his hardware. That's how I know it's not, say, another centipede guy. There's only one person with that much metal attached to him."

"Iron Man," Jemma says.

"Not _attached_ ," Skye says. "Besides, Stark's armor puts out a completely different signature. It's nothing like the Hydra-slash-Cybertek stuff." She squints at the screen, taps it. "Kind of weird he's not moving, though."

"Maybe he's asleep?" Jemma tilts her head, nearly colliding with Skye's.

Skye shakes her head. "That's not a part of New York you sleep in. Come on." She grabs Jemma's backpack and starts towards the mouth of the alley where she's parked their SUV.

Jemma has to run a few steps to catch up with her. "Perhaps we should call for backup?"

"He's alone," Skye says. "If there were anyone else with him, either he'd be moving or he wouldn't've shown up because he'd be dead." She's almost totally sure of that. Mostly. "And also, if S.H.I.E.L.D. finds him, they'll just turn him over to the military like they did with the Hydra operatives." And unlike Grant fucking-traitor Ward, Mike doesn't deserve to be locked up for the rest of his life.

Skye yanks the SUV door open with way more force than necessary.

"We're S.H.I.E.L.D.," Jemma says as she gets into the passenger side.

"Yes. But we're not going to tell anyone unless we have to." Skye slams the door, jams the key into the ignition, stabs her seatbelt into the buckle and wrenches the car into life. "Buckled up?"

"Yes." Jemma looks at Skye worriedly. "What if Coulson asks where we've been?"

"We can tell A.C.," Skye says. "He's pretty forgiving."

* * *

"Ooh, eerie abandoned building. My favorite," Skye says. She gets out of the SUV quietly, hoping that Mike didn't hear them rattling onto the cracked pavement surrounding the power plant. Jemma gets out just as quietly from her side, looking scared but determined as she hefts her bag of medical equipment.

"Has he moved?" she asks Skye, very soft.

Skye checks her phone screen again, then shakes her head. "He's alive, though." If he was dead the orange dot would disappear. Probably.

She holds on to that as they creep their way inside the ancient building. It used to be a power plant, but now it's pretty much a collection of rusting scaffolds and stairs, scattered pieces of metal and glass and a sense of impending doom. Or maybe that last part's just Skye. But each scuff of her booted feet over the cracked concrete floor sounds whispery and old, like the wheeze of some dying dragon.

A dragon could fit in here. Like, Smaug could fit in here, with the whole shire of hobbits for when he got hungry. At this rate Mike will either have run or actually died before they can find him.

Skye checks her phone screen again, which is the only thing offering any kind of illumination, aside from the optimistic circles of their flashlights. Skye is used to cities, where night is nothing but a faint hint on the other side of a barrier of light. Here, in a place that used to make that light, the darkness is the barrier. Deep and black and ancient.

Right now Skye doesn't appreciate the poetic irony very much.

The orange dot still hasn't moved. Otherwise, all she can tell from the pathetic estimate of a map is that Mike's somewhere on their right. Far on their right. Which could be on the other side of a pit full of lava, for all she can tell.

She touches Jemma's arm, then points when the other woman looks in her direction. Jemma nods.

"Maybe we should call out to him? Let him know we're friendly?" she whispers. "He must already know we're coming."

Skye nods tightly. She swallows, though her mouth is too dry with tension for it to help. She pockets her phone and draws her gun, holding it and the flashlight just like Ward taught her. He was great with passing on the skill set; she has to give him that. He was just lousy at anything to do with being a decent human being.

"Mike?" she tries as they creep forward, and forward, and forward. Her voice creaks and she has to clear her throat and try again. "Mike? It's Skye. If you can hear me, let me know where you are. Are you hurt?"

She and Jemma stop, listening. There's nothing—

Not nothing. Something moved.

The _ratatattat_ of Skye's heartbeat sounds appallingly loud, but she just murmurs, "stay behind me," to Jemma and walks towards the noise. Another small eternity later she totally doesn't do more than gasp in shock when her flashlight beam grazes over the top of a boot sole.

She swings the light back immediately, and it meets up with Jemma's and now they've illuminated the black boots with the biker-gang buckles, black military-style pants and the black thing on his torso that looks weirdly like leather plate armor. And Skye is already very, very sure that this isn't Mike before they even get to the dusty and blood-spattered metal arms with the Hydra skull on each shoulder, or the white skin and holy fuck that's Grant Ward.

Jemma makes a horrible noise of shock and anger and revulsion and fear, and Skye is very, very glad that she's the one with the drawn weapon. Because she can't really think of why she shouldn't put all fifteen bullets into his skull right now, and Ward didn't do anything _near_ as evil to her as what he did to FitzSimmons.

But it's Jemma who puts her small, shaking hand on Skye's arm. "We need him alive," she says, with the kind of sharp authority she only gets when she's saving someone's life. Which of course she is. Ward's life. "We need to know who sent him."

"Right," Skye says. Her hands are also shaking from adrenaline, which sucks, but she's close enough that she really couldn't miss anyway. And Ward's not moving. He's sitting up leaning against a very old piece of machinery with his back against the wall, with his hands (his metal hands, holy _fuck_ ) loose and open on the floor. His eyes are closed, face bloodless under his short-cropped black hair. There's blood on his lips, staining his chin, and a large, dark wet stain down his left side. His lips are tinged blue, like a kid who's been in a pool too long. "Um, is he breathing?"

She's not sure she wants him to be breathing. She's so angry and so freaked out to see him here that it's kind of hard for _her_ to breathe. But she's not sure she wants him not to be breathing, either. There's a tiny, stupid part of her that's happy to see him. The same tiny stupid part that still misses the man she thought he was.

Jemma doesn't respond with words, but she goes to her knees at his side and spreads her medical pack open, putting her fingers to the pulse point in his throat. She grimaces, then grabs a pair of bandage scissors and starts trying to slice his fetish-gear vest from the high collar to the cuff.

Tries. Whatever it's made of, it's too much for the poor scissors. Skye hears Jemma swearing under her breath and she wants to help—she has a combat knife, maybe that'd work—but she's the one holding the flashlight and the gun and she's not about to put either of them down. Especially not when Ward's eyes fly open and he grabs Jemma by the neck with both his hands.

Skye shoots him.

Technically, she shoots the wall right above his head. She was aiming for his head, because Jemma's in front of the rest of him. And she missed, damn it, but it's still enough to get his attention.

"Let her go, Ward, or the next one's between your eyes," Skye snarls at him.

She expects him to snarl something right back at her about how she couldn't let Mike kill him so he knows she won't shoot him now, or maybe something about her lousy aim. She doesn't expect anything like the blank shock in his eyes.

Skye shoots at him again, deliberately aiming for the same chunk of wall above his head this time. He doesn't even flinch when a sliver of concrete creases a thin, red diagonal line across his forehead. "I am not fucking kidding. _Let. Her. Go._ "

He doesn't, though he doesn't seem to be holding Jemma tightly enough to do more than prevent her from moving. She's scrabbling like crazy at his hands, but she's obviously still breathing, if uncomfortable and likely scared as hell. Ward, though, is looking at Skye like he's never seen her before.

He's definitely having a lot of trouble breathing, but he tries to speak anyway, pausing to suck air between the words. "Why…do you…know my…name?"

"What?"

Jemma stops scrabbling and instead punches Ward in the side, right where all the blood starts. He cries out breathlessly and kind of tosses Jemma away from him so he can clutch at the wound.

"Jemma, you all right?" Skye asks, never taking her eyes off him.

"Yes," Jemma croaks. She scrambles back to Skye, hand on her throat and coughing. "Ward, I'm trying to _help_ you, you stupid ass!"

He looks back up at them, gasping for breath and with nothing at all like comprehension on his face. "You know…my name?"

"Of course we do," Skye snaps at him. "We know exactly who you are. Why do you think I have the gun, dumbass? Now, are you going to let Jemma fix the hole in your side? Because I'm all for letting you drown in your own blood, but she's way nicer than I am and you really fucking owe her big time."

Ward's still just looking at them, like nothing she said made a dent in his thick stupid skull. "Who am I?"

"Oh," Jemma says.

"You really don't know. Seriously? You don't know?" Skye's hands and arms are getting sore, but she doesn't dare lower them in case this is some kind of trick. Ward was a fantastic liar. It took her finding Koenig's body to even suspect that he wasn't exactly who everyone thought he was.

It's just…right now, he really doesn't look like he's lying.

He shakes his head, then coughs, scattering blood. He's still looking at them with dull incomprehension. "…Monster," he rasps.

"You are," Jemma says. "But I'll be damned if I'm letting you die here." She takes a step towards him, careful to stay to the side so she won't get shot. "Now, how do I get that bloody leather thing—"

Ward's entire body stiffens, his eyes bright with alarm and chest heaving as he labors for air. "They're here," he says.

"Who?" Skye demands.

"Handlers," Ward says. He lifts his hand and curls it around a pipe attached to the machinery next to him. He pulls himself heavily to his feet, then catches himself when his legs don't want to hold him. He leans against the wall, panting in exhaustion and pain. Standing seems to help him breathe a little more easily, though.

The pipe is completely crushed in his fist, and Skye remembers why she thought her phone had found Mike Peterson. Except instead they found the Hydra assassin who almost killed Captain America.

"What the hell did they do to you?"

"Leave," Ward says, still gasping. He looks terrified. "Please. Go. They'll kill you."

"Your handlers? Who are your handlers?" Skye demands.

"Taylor," Ward says.

"Taylor?" Skye repeats, but she can hear them too now, the faint sound of voices, echoing like ricochets through the building. People are coming. "Oh, fuck."

Jemma glances at her before she snatches up the scissors and throws them into the medical pack and zips it shut. Skye can see that Jemma's thinking the exact same thing—how their black SUV with the S.H.I.E.L.D. logo is parked right outside.

"That way," Ward says. He points to his right, past lumps of unidentifiable machinery. He pushes himself away from the wall, nearly falls again but manages to catch himself. "Go."

"Come with us," Jemma says. "We can help."

Ward shakes his head. "I'll distract them. Go!"

Skye holsters her gun and grabs Jemma's arm and runs.

He pointed them to a set of enormous, floor-to-ceiling windows, all broken. It's such a perfect back exit that she's surprised that there are no Hydra agents waiting for them. But then she hears shouting and the clear, brutal sounds of a fight, and when she turns around to see she understands why they stayed together.

There are eight agents, and Ward has taken on all of them. 

Skye can only see what's happening in glimpses of illumination from the flashlights mounted on the Hydra agents' weapons. She can tell that Ward throws one of his attackers into two others because a trio of lights go down. She sees a fourth light go flying, and then there's a lot of gunfire and she can't tell if he was hit or not. But then Jemma is the one grabbing her wrist and yanking her out the broken window to run deep into the untended forest surrounding the plant. 

And as she runs with Jemma into the woods, all Skye can think of is how a man she once loved and then hated for his betrayal might have just died protecting them from Hydra. And she doesn't get it. She doesn't get it at all.

* * *

Coulson requests the briefing at around six in the morning, about an hour after Thor and Tony came back from Yonkers, each carrying a young, female agent. Right now it's just seven of them, gathered in the very large living room of the common floor of the building: the Avengers, minus Bucky in the medical suite and Bruce recovering from becoming the Hulk; and Coulson.

"Here." Coulson slides something in a plastic evidence bag across the table to Tony, who stops it with a slap. He lifts the bag, peering at the contents. "We found that on the sidewalk of the building where the Winter Soldier confronted the Hydra assassin, along with his handgun." Coulson's smile is wry. "No prints, of course. We're having it analyzed, but right now we're relying on the NYPD, so it's slow going."

Clint looks gobsmacked. "Are they seriously not making Captain America almost being murdered a priority?"

"They shouldn't," Steve says quietly. "I'm no more important than anyone else." He looks better than when Sam last saw him, though that was in the medical suite after his surgery and almost right after Bucky had been taken in to repair his shoulder. Steve hadn't been awake at the time, which in retrospect was pretty lucky.

The slice on Steve's face has been nicely stitched up and already looks fully closed at the edges, and his nose is only slightly swollen and a little discolored. His ear will most likely heal up without even a scar. He was still limping when he came in, but he got there just fine, and in a couple days he probably won't look like he got hurt at all.

Emotionally, though, Steve looks worse than he did on the bridge, when he realized he knew the man who'd been trying so hard to kill him.

Tony snorts, still looking at the bag. "No, of course not. Why would you be more important? You're just a national icon who's already saved the world three times. No reason for you to jump the line at all." 

"Exactly," Steve says. "If I start using my job to get special privileges—"

"Yeah, yeah," Tony interrupts him as he rips the bag open. "You're just an ordinary American and anyone would do the same thing if they could. Blah, blah, martyr, blah. Luckily it wasn't your decision, Capsicle." He dumps the metal thing in the bag onto the table. Sam instantly recognizes it's what's left of the bug thing that nearly killed Bucky and then Tony.

"Is that safe?" Sam asks.

"It's fine." Tony waves a hand in Sam's direction, head over the remains of the robot. "Completely dead, after you went all Vietnam on it." He pokes one of the jellyfish tendrils coiled on the tabletop, then looks up at Coulson. "Let me guess. You want me to figure out who made this, right?"

"Yes." Coulson nods. "I would've had one of mine look at it, but…" Sam can see his jaw work. "He was injured."

"Hey, no problem," Tony says, leaning back in his chair. Sam wonders if Tony's fooling anyone with the fake nonchalance, considering he's been glancing towards the elevator as much as Steve has; as if Bucky's going to come swaggering out any second, grinning unapologetically for being late. "Isn't that what Reserve S.H.I.E.L.D. Agents are for?"

"You're still a consultant," Coulson says.

Tony makes a face. "Do I at least get a badge? I want a badge."

"Could we get on with this, please?" Steve says, with the awful, strained politeness that Sam knows means he's holding on to his temper by the skin of his teeth.

"We're just waiting on Jemma and Skye," Coulson says. He has a way of speaking gently without being patronizing, something Sam still worries about managing.

"J.A.R.V.I.S., could you please tell Coulson's angels to get their hustle on?" Tony says.

"They just entered the elevator in the guest suite," J.A.R.V.I.S. says. Sam doesn't think he's imagining the smugness in the A.I.'s tone.

The elevator opens a minute later and two young women come out, looking freshly-showered but tired and still jittery from adrenaline. They seem barely old enough to have graduated high school.

"We're here, we're here. What'd we miss?" says the dark-haired one.

"Oh, dear. Have you all been waiting for us?" The lighter-haired one asks in a sweet British accent.

"I was just asking Tony to see if he can find out who made the miniature attack-robot that Trip and May brought back in the SUV that didn't get stolen by Hydra," Coulson says. He smiles blandly at the women. They shuffle guiltily. "Skye, Jemma, meet the Avengers. Avengers, this is Jemma and Skye. Jemma is a biochemist and Skye specializes in electronic espionage."

"Ah, it's you," Tony says to Skye. "Great." He leans across the table, holding his hand out to her. "All right, let's get this party started. Gimme." He snaps his fingers when Skye stares blankly at him. "Your phone with the handy cyborg-finder app."

"Oh, yeah, sure." Skye reaches into her breast pocket to get her phone and then slides it over to him.

Tony grabs it and sits up, then looks at the phone in horror. "Is this a Galaxy?" He turns to Coulson, face full of affronted incredulity. "You're giving your agents _Galaxy_ phones? Is this some kind of passive-aggressive, I stole the Avengers so you're using Galaxy phones thing? Because seriously, if I knew you were going to be like that, I—"

"Tony," Steve says. It's not even loud, but the exhaustion and anxiety in his voice carries.

Tony clears his throat. "Um, anyway. Cool app," he says to Skye. "Seriously, this is really good. I'm impressed."

"Wow. Really?" Skye lights up, looking even younger with her enthusiasm. She starts leaning towards him, mouth opening, then seems to remember where she is and sits up straight in her chair with her hands clasped primly on the table. "Thank you."

Tony gives her a small nod and smile, then puts the phone down with the screen facing up. Sam can see an outline of the United States. "J, I need you to see if you can widen the search with the same parameters."

"Certainly, sir," the A.I. says. "I'm afraid it may take some time, however, to connect to available satellites. And of course it will take longer if Ward is no longer in the United States."

"Ward may not be anywhere," Natasha speaks for the first time. She's sitting next to Steve, Thor flanking his other side. Sam's sure she's holding Steve's hand under the table. "The faction who have him now could just decide to cut their losses and kill him." She looks at Skye and Jemma. "Especially now that they know how close S.H.I.E.L.D. got to him."

Jemma looks horrified. "Oh, no. Would they really do that?"

"We weren't even looking for him," Skye says, as if that would somehow make a difference. "We thought he was Mike Peterson."

"And the three of us are going to have a long, unpleasant conversation about that," Coulson says. "But Natasha's right. If they caused all the chaos in New York for the sole purpose of making Captain America vulnerable to assassination, they'll be pissed that their Asset dropped the ball. Between that and S.H.I.E.L.D. showing up, It's possible they'll terminate him."

Skye stares at him. "Like, they'll kill him out of _spite?_ "

"Not spite, expediency," Clint says. "You don't waste hay on a lame horse; you take it out to the back pasture and shoot it."

"He's not a horse," Tony says.

"Would they not consider this…Ward too valuable to destroy so meaninglessly?" Thor asks.

"They can always find another one," Natasha says with a calm assurance that's chilling. "But even if they don't kill him, more than likely he won't know anything beyond what was required for the mission."

"He didn't even know his name," Jemma murmurs.

"Yeah, about that," Tony says. "This Grant Ward guy—if he was already Hydra's golden boy, why go for the winterizing?" He spreads his hands. "I can understand the cyborg augmentations, those are kind of cool. But the rest just seems like overkill. I mean, he volunteered, right? So why fuck with his brain?"

Natasha's smirk is a bitter, angry twist on her lips. "He didn't volunteer, believe me."

"He looked terrified when he heard the handlers coming for him," Skye says. Even her choice of words sounds sinister. "And he fought them off so Jemma and I would have time to get out."

"He didn't want to kill me," Steve adds. "He even apologized, if you can believe it. It wasn't like…how Bucky was. Before the helicarrier, I could've been anyone."

"You were anyone," Natasha says to him. "Or, rather, you weren't anyone at all."

Steve nods. "The mission."

"That changed quickly though," Sam says to Steve, as much to remind him of what Bucky was already able to come back from, how strong he is. "Could be Ward's breaking his programming too."

"It doesn't matter," Coulson says with finality. "We need to know what he knows, and we need to find out who's keeping him and where. If we're lucky, we'll have that information in time to hit them before they have a chance to destroy their records."

"And now would be your cue to tell us you've found him, J," Tony says.

"I'm afraid I'm unable to do that, sir," J.A.R.V.I.S. says, sounding truly regretful. "But Dr. Zaccaro requested I inform you that Sergeant Barnes is awake and able to have visitors."

Steve's head snaps up. He's practically halfway out of his chair before he seems to realize that the meeting isn't officially over yet. He's the leader of the Avengers, but it's still Coulson he looks at for permission to leave. It's incredibly polite and a little sad.

"Go ahead," Coulson says, seeing his desperation as clearly as everyone else. Coulson doesn't know that Bucky tried to hack his own arm off, but Steve told him about the new dissociation of his identities since his fight with Ward last night. "We're just about finished here anyway."

Steve nods his thanks, then gets up and goes immediately to the elevator. He's not even limping anymore.

Thor gives a quick farewell and gets up to follow Steve. Sam has a feeling whatever Thor wants to talk to him about concerns Bucky, since the only Avenger who doesn't know what happened last night is Bruce. He's still recovering from Hulking out the day before, and no one wanted to wake him for something terrible that he couldn't do anything about.

"Yay, recess." Tony tosses and catches the robot thing then pockets it as he gets out of his chair. He pushes the phone back to Skye. "You ever want a job with a decent salary and no one shooting at you, just give Pepper Potts a call. Tell her I recommended you." He juts his chin at Coulson. "Agent has her number."

Jemma frowns at him. "His name is Phillip."

"He knows," Coulson says. "We'll be in touch," he says to the Avengers still in the room, then gestures to Jemma and Skye to follow him to the elevators. "Come on. It's time for the unpleasant conversation."

"Can we have breakfast first?" Skye asks him, all big brown puppy eyes.

"No."

Sam waits with Clint and Natasha. He puts his arm around her shoulder, gratified as always when she leans into him. He knows it's still hard for her to show that much affection sometimes, like when she's worried or gets reminded of her horrific childhood. Clint seems troubled as well, which isn't surprising. His childhood wasn't as regimented in its horror as Natasha's, but from what Sam's gleaned over the months, almost nothing about it was good. He knows exactly where the comment about lame horses comes from.

"I don't know about you two," he says, "but I could use some breakfast. And a nap."

"Nap sounds good," Clint says. He raises his eyebrows hopefully. "Are you making breakfast?"

"Sure," Sam says, sighing inwardly. He's not entirely certain where he got the reputation of being the coffee and food guy, but he suspects Tony had something to do with it. Bucky too, probably.

Sam really doesn't want to think about Bucky right now.

"How about pancakes?" he says, gently steering Natasha toward the kitchen, which is even larger than the living room. They're easy, and about the best comfort food he can think of.

"I'll help," Natasha says. She puts her arm around Sam's waist as they walk, leaning into him without knocking either of them off stride. "We should make extra, for the others."

"Totally," Sam says. "I was already planning to."


	3. Chapter 3

The medical suite in Avengers Tower is nicer than any hospital Steve's ever been in. It's all plush chairs and not-cheesy paintings and pleasant colors, and staff who smile and treat the patients like they're humans in pain rather than bodies that aren't working right.

Bucky's room is spacious and airy, with unobtrusive light blue walls and large windows overlooking the astonishingly huge green space behind the tower. The medical equipment is all state of the art Stark tech, which means it likely works better than anything else on the planet. All the same, it's a relief that the only equipment he can see attached to Bucky is an oxygen monitor on his index finger and a blood pressure cuff on his arm.

The comfortable, quiet room doesn't change the fact that Bucky's right wrist is in a special restraint, fastened to what Steve knows is a bed capable of surviving damage from anyone short of the Hulk. He knows that Bucky's ankles are restrained as well, underneath the soft, warm blanket. 

Bucky's left arm is gone. There's a thick bandage wrapped artfully around what's left, which is practically nothing. Steve doesn't know how badly Bucky's arm was hurt when he fell, but it looks like everything up to the shoulder blade is gone. Bucky looks terribly incomplete without his left arm. Steve's never seen him without at least the housing attached to his shoulder, but that had to be removed to repair the stab wound.

Bucky has his head turned towards the window, but his eyes are closed. Asleep, it looks like. Steve goes in anyway, easing the door softly shut behind him. He hates how he's as relieved as he's disappointed, but he doesn't even know what to say to him. 'What were you thinking?' and 'how could you be so stupid?' probably aren't going to get him much, and Steve's trying really hard not to be angry anyway. He really does remember that whatever this is, it's not actually Bucky's fault. It's the result of what was done to him. What they'd all thought was over, but now it turns out might never be.

Hell, Steve's not even sure who he'd be talking to. 

Steve lifts one of the chairs. It's light plastic but still remarkably comfortable, like everything else in the med suite. He carefully carries it over to Bucky's right side and puts it down just as carefully, but Bucky's eyes shoot open. 

He whips up onto his right side, trying to reach for Steve with his left arm. Whatever he does to what's left of it hurts, and he falls back to the bed grimacing in pain.

"Bucky, Bucky. It's okay. It's me, Steve. You're safe. You're in a hospital, but you're safe. There's nothing here that can hurt you." He's said some variation of those words twenty-one times since they brought Bucky home from Asgard, talking him down each time he woke up sweating and shaking or thrashing and screaming out of a nightmare. Steve remembers every one of them.

Bucky lays there panting, but Steve can't tell if it's from remembered fear or pain. He looks at Steve, tries to move his right arm, but doesn't seem surprised that he can't. His grin is so forced it's painful to look at. "Hey, Stevie," he says. "You come to spring me?"

"Not yet," Steve says, and he's sure his smile is just as painful. He wraps his hand around Bucky's, wishing he could undo the restraints. Wishing he trusted Bucky enough. "I'm sorry," he adds sincerely when Bucky's face falls. "You're not all healed yet. And, well, we're all kind of worried about you."

"No fooling." Bucky tugs pointedly at the restraint on his wrist, but keeps his light grip on Steve's hand. "Everyone's been treating me like I'm gonna throw myself off the roof 'soon as they let me outta here. Like I've gone wacky or something. What's going on?"

"You don't remember?" Steve asks, because Bucky's blue eyes are so guileless that's the only thing he can think of.

Bucky frowns. "Sure, I remember. I was trying to knock off that soulless creep who tried to kill you. If that little booger hadn't shoved me out, I wouldn't be here."

Steve almost blurts out, "You'd be dead!", but he has enough self-control to keep his mouth shut, even though his thoughts feel like shrapnel skittering around the inside of his skull. He remembers what Sam told him, how James said that Sergeant Barnes had tried to kill the Asset. Not Bucky. Barnes. Like they were two different people.

Steve thought he was talking to Bucky, but he's not. And he doesn't know who the hell this is, this new identity who's holding Steve's lover's body hostage but talking like he owns it. It's terrifying. Steve pulls his hand away, clasps the bedrail instead. "Who are you?"

Bucky looks up at Steve in confusion. His arm twitches like he wants to reach for him. "What're you talking about? I'm Bucky."

"James called you Sergeant Barnes," Steve says.

Barnes huffs out a breath. "Yeah. I am."

Steve swallows. "Where's Bucky? The real one."

"I am the real one," Barnes says. His expression darkens, but Steve's surprised to see that it's not just with anger but also shock and hurt. "I am the real one. You pulled me outta that…" He grits his teeth, exhales harshly. "Outta that factory run by the guy with the red skull-face. And then I was part of your Howling Commandos. The other Bucky wasn't there. _I_ was. Me."

"Wait," Steve says, numb with astonishment. "You, you mean…" He stops, realizes he doesn't even know how to piece together the question. "When I found you, on that table in Zola's lab. That was…you? Not, Bucky?" He wants to say 'my Bucky', but he doesn't.

Barnes looks up at the ceiling, but he squeezes his eyes shut. Steve's sure he'd be scrubbing his face if he could move his hand. "No," he says tightly. "That was James. That was James on the table. He let me take over at the bridge thing so we could get outta there."

"James?" Steve parrots. But he remembers now, just like he remembers everything: the way Bucky clung to him; the way he asked if Steve's transformation had hurt, as if that was the most important thing. To James it would've been. Of course it would.

He feels a little sick, like right after he got shot last night, though he knows his head is fine. "Where was Bucky?"

He can tell that Barnes wants to snap that he's Bucky again. His jaw works like he's physically holding the words in. "He was…behind me. Like he is now." Barnes looks at Steve, as if he knows how hard that is to understand. "He's…quiet. But he's there."

"Behind you," Steve repeats. All he can picture is Bucky locked in a cage or boarded up inside a wall. "Is he all right?"

Barnes nods. "Yeah, sure. He's just quiet, 'cause I took over."

"You mean, asleep?" Steve asks, bewildered.

"Not really. He's just, behind me. But I can…" Barnes squints, concentrating. "Not talk to him, exactly. But, he's there. He knows what I'm doing."

"Does he know you almost killed him?"

Barnes stares at him. " _What?_ "

"You almost killed him," Steve repeats, letting some of his anger out, his horror at what almost happened. "Him, and James, and even you. You tried to cut your own arm off, Bucky!" he says when Barnes' only response is more of the wide-eyed disbelief. "You almost cut off your arm! What did you think that was going to do?"

Barnes looks like he's not sure if he should be angry or worried about what's going on in Steve's head. "What the God-damned fuck are you talking about? I told you already—I was going to rub out the Asset. And I would've, if the brat hadn't gone nuts." He jerks his right arm, then scowls when he remembers he can't move it. "I was doing my _job_ , that's all. Why is everyone acting like I'm some kinda lunatic?"

Steve opens his mouth to argue, but he looks at the incomprehension on Barnes' face and just shuts it again. He swallows. "So, what happened to your arm, then?" he asks finally.

Barnes glances at his left shoulder, then back at Steve. He looks only barely less confused. "They said it got busted when I fell outta the train."

"Oh," Steve says softly. He rubs his hand over his face, feeling exhausted and overwhelmed and physically ill. He has to take a few deep breaths before he can talk again. "So, when we were part of the Howling Commandos…that was you? The whole time?"

"Yeah." Barnes nods. "Until I fell. I already told you that."

"You did. I'm sorry. I didn't understand," Steve says softly. But he's beginning to, and the revelation is very much like he's just been stabbed through the heart. "What happened after you fell?"

Barnes gives him an aborted shrug with his right shoulder, but he looks up at the ceiling again. "I don't know. James said I died, but I couldn't've, since I came back. I just remember holding onto that rail, you reaching for me, and then this drop like…It went on forever. I just kept falling. And then, nothing. Until last night."

"I'm sorry," Steve says, meaning it. "Why did you come back?"

Barnes looks at him again. "You got hurt."

"You mean, last night?" Steve asks, because he knew he'd been hurt pretty badly, but he doesn't know why it would've made Bucky… _splinter_ like this. Like the healing in Asgard never happened.

Barnes nods. "Bucky heard the gunshot, and then there you were, laying on the ground all sliced to ribbons, with that new Asset ready to give it to you. So we went after him. And then I took over."

He makes it sound as easy as a relay race, and yet a few hours later Bucky was nearly killed because of it.

Steve reminds himself fiercely that this isn't Barnes' fault; it isn't Bucky's fault. And Barnes wasn't actually trying to hurt Bucky or James. "Why did you take over?"

"I protect you. And Bucky and James," Barnes says. "It's my job. I told you."

"Yeah, you told me," Steve says, then has to clear his throat. He knows he's still reeling with the knowledge that the man he lived with, fought with, fucking _pined over_ for a year wasn't Bucky. He hadn't known, hadn't even guessed. And what kind of friend does that make him? "But, why would Bucky just let you take over?"

"Well, it wasn't like I just gave him the bum's rush, or anything," Barnes says. He looks like what he's talking about is so obvious he has no idea why they're even having this conversation. "I was behind him for a while, until the other Asset slapped the bug on his arm. Then I had to get James to take care of it. And after that, it was me."

"And then you tried to kill the first Asset. To protect James and Bucky." Steve tightens his grip on the bedrail because he wants to grab Barnes and shake him, as if that would somehow make Barnes understand what he almost did.

"Christ almighty, Steve," Barnes lets out a heavy breath of pure frustration. "Not them, _you_. He tried to kill you twice, for fuck's sake. You don't leave a rabid dog like that running around, you put it down. That's what I was trying to do with the other one, before he dropped us with the robot thing." He glowers at Steve. " _Nobody_ hurts you on my watch, you get it? Nobody."

"You were going to kill him? But, what if he's like that because they tortured him, the way they did to you?" Steve asks incredulously. "Doesn't he deserve a chance?"

"Yeah, I was gonna kill him," Barnes snaps. "You gone deaf or something? I just said that. No way was I giving him another chance to hurt you." He pointedly turns his head away. "Do we gotta keep talking about this? My shoulder hurts, my head's fucking _killing_ me, and all you wanna do is give me twenty questions? Go chase yourself. I'm tired."

"I've been looking after myself a long time, Barnes," Steve grinds out. "I don't need you to do that. I need you to give Bucky back."

Barnes whips his head over to look at Steve again, his eyes wide with betrayal before his expression goes thunderous. "I am Bucky, you son of a bitch! The only reason I'm here is because of you. If you weren't dumb enough to let yourself get led right into an ambush I'd still be, I dunno, dead. Gone. It don't matter. What matters is that I'm the one who looked after Bucky and James, and I'm sure as hell the one who looked after _you_. If that's not good enough, then fuck you," he spits out. "Just, fuck you."

"If you really were looking after Bucky and James, you wouldn't be laying here without your left arm." Steve's fairly sure he's bending the bedrail. "You keep saying your job is to protect them, but you almost killed them." He gestures sharply at his own left shoulder. "You stabbed yourself in the shoulder, Bucky! Why can't you understand that? If you'd been half an inch lower you would've bled to death." He digs the heels of his shaking hands into his eyes. It's all he's been able to think about: how he came within half an inch of losing Bucky again, from a self-inflicted wound.

"I stabbed the _Asset_ , Steve," Barnes says, with the knife-edged patience that means Steve's stepped on Bucky's last nerve. It's Barnes speaking, but Steve recognizes the tone anyway.

Steve swallows. "The Asset is part of you, Sergeant. Just like Bucky and James."

"I'm nothing like him!" Barnes shouts, enraged. His right arm jerks again, like he's going to reach for Steve. Or try to clock him, more likely. "I'm not a killer! I don't hurt people for no reason! He has _nothing_ to do with me! Take that back! Take that back right now!" Barnes lifts up on his side, like he's so angry he's forgotten he has no left arm. "Take it back!"

"That's not what I meant," Steve says quickly. "I'm sorry. That's not what I meant. I just meant—your arm, you did that. With the knife. That's why you're here!"

"Shut up!" Barnes' lips are drawn so far back in a snarl he looks like he's in pain. "Just shut up. I don't know what the fuck's eating you, but I've had enough of your shit. And I am _done_ listening to you telling me I'm just like some kinda' murdering Hydra asshole." He jerks his chin violently at the door. "Get out."

"Bucky—"

"I said, _get out._ "

Steve doesn't know when he grabbed the bedrail again, but his knuckles are bloodless and his hands ache. "Then let me talk to James."

Barnes turns away from him. "Go to hell." 

Steve sucks in a breath through his teeth. "Fine, then. James, take over like you did before. Shove him out."

"No!" Barnes snaps his head back, staring at Steve in shock before his eyes narrow to angry slits. "Don't you dare! Steve, you fuck! Don't you dare!"

"James, shove Barnes out. Right now," Steve says, no question about the command in it. "Take over. Shove. Him. Out."

Barnes' eyes widen, then he grits his teeth, groaning through them like he's in pain. He glares at Steve in rage, but then clenches his eyes shut, tipping his head back. The groan turns into an inarticulate cry and then cuts off all at once.

And it's James who opens his eyes. Steve can tell because of how they instantly go bright and liquid with guilt and fear. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry. I tried to tell him but he doesn't understand. Please don't be mad."

"I'm not mad at you," Steve says, because that's true. He's furious at Barnes. He deliberately relaxes his fingers and takes James' hand. James clutches it so hard it hurts. "I'm not mad at all, but I'd really like to have Bucky back. Um, for him to take over, I mean. Can you do that?"

James shakes his head miserably. "I can't. I'm sorry."

"Why not?" Steve is careful to keep his voice even, not to lose his temper again. He's frightened that Bucky's been buried under Barnes and James, that this time Steve's lost him forever. But getting angry at James isn't going to help.

"If I bring him out, he'll just step back for Sergeant Barnes again. That's what he always does. That's what he always did, I mean. Until Sergeant Barnes died."

Steve blinks. "Why would he let Barnes just take over like that? He's dangerous."

James shakes his head again. "Sergeant Barnes protects us. He's only dangerous to bad people."

"He almost killed you," Steve manages not to shout it.

"He didn't know!" James says vehemently. "It's not his fault that he doesn't understand. He died before I made the Asset."

"Wait, what?" Steve says, bewildered. "What do you mean, you made him? How?"

James tries to shrug, but his right arm's trapped and his left shoulder hurts and he just ends up wincing. "I let him out."

"Oh," Steve says softly. He puts his face in his hands. He feels like he's been dumped into Oz. He wants this to be over, for Bucky to be there and himself and all right so badly it's like a physical pain.

"I'm sorry I let him out," James says on an anxious rush of air.

Steve looks at him. "James, I—"

"I didn't want to," James goes on, speaking faster like he's worried Steve won't let him finish. "I know he's bad and he killed lots of people and I should never have made him. But the bad guys wanted _Bucky_ to kill people and they kept hurting me and hurting me because he was fighting so hard not to. And Bucky was… He was really scared. And angry, and sad. And I knew he was going to die, if he had to do what they wanted. And Sergeant Barnes was dead already, so he couldn't do it instead of him. So, I made the Asset. Because he didn't remember anything and he didn't care. So Bucky was safe."

Steve swallows. His throat hurts. "That was very brave of you."

James still looks afraid. "Are you mad at me?"

"No. No, I'm not angry." Steve shakes his head. "I'm just…" He rubs his eyes. "I'm just trying to understand. I didn't know that, um, you guys made each other. It's…" _Astonishing. Horrific. Terrifying._ "Not what I expected." He scrapes up something like a smile. "Did you make Sergeant Barnes too?"

James shakes his head. "Bucky did."

Steve blinks. "I didn't know that." He didn't know any of this was even possible. But, if Bucky made Sergeant Barnes, it makes more sense why he'd be so willing to let him take over, or whatever the hell is going on in Bucky's head. It makes as much sense as any of this, anyway. "So, who made you?"

"No one did," James says. He stares at Steve and it's clear he's confused by the question. "I fell down the stairs."

"You fell down the stairs?" Steve says. He's about to ask if James means he fell out of the train, but then something about the words pulls at a thread in his memory and he stops. He hasn't forgotten anything since the serum, but before that his ability to recall things was only as good as anyone else's. So it takes a moment for him to figure out why what James said is familiar. And then when he remembers it, it takes him another moment to be able to breathe.

"James," he says, gasping over the name like he might have nearly a century ago, when he was a sickly and asthmatic child. _A child. Dear God._ "James, how old are you?"

James' eyes widen. He gulps visibly, then puts on a nonchalance so transparent it's ridiculous. "Same age as Bucky."

"No you're not, are you?" Steve says, trying to keep his voice gentle when he actually wants to start screaming. "It's okay, you can tell me. I'm not going to get angry, I promise. I just need to know."

James shakes his head. His chest starts heaving and he's suddenly close to panic. He starts squirming in the bed, tugging at his wrist and ankle restraints, trying to run.

Steve immediately undoes his wrist restraint and helps James sit up so he can hug him. "It's okay, it's okay," he says. "It's okay. I'm not mad, I promise. No one's going to hurt you. I just need to know, all right? Nothing bad is going to happen. I just need to know how old you are."

"I'm sorry." James is shaking in Steve's arms. "I'm s-sorry. I have to pretend. I have to pretend so they won't know. Bucky t-told me."

"It's okay," Steve says again, despite how it feels like the worst lie he's ever told anyone. He has no idea how anything can ever be okay after this, with what he's now sure of. "Bucky was right, but you're safe here. You're safe. No one is going to hurt you anymore. So you can tell me. It's all right."

James wipes his eyes with his fingertips. He nods. "Okay."

"How old are you?" Steve asks him.

"I'm nine," James says.

* * *

"We have to fix this. We have to get Bucky back to his right mind before destroys himself," Steve says. It's the first thing out of his mouth as he marches into the kitchen right from the med suite. 

No one needs to ask what he means, but Sam blinks at him, looking concerned. "Bucky's not alone right now, is he?"

Steve shakes his head. "I made sure there was a nurse with him. His restraints are off, but he promised me he wouldn't leave."

"Because Bucky's never left anywhere you told him not to," Clint says.

"James was the one who promised me," Steve says. "He'll keep it."

Clint shrugs. "Hopefully."

"J.A.R.V.I.S., please alert us if Bucky Barnes leaves the med suite without supervision," Tony says, before Steve gets pissed at Clint questioning his boyfriend's honesty or virtue or truthiness or whatever. He just shrugs innocently when Steve turns his burgeoning glare from Clint to him. "I'm sure he'll stay put, but now it won't be an issue." 

"Of course, sir," J.A.R.V.I.S. says. "He's watching _The Lord of the Rings_ on a Starktab at the moment."

"Good," Steve says. He leans his fists on the table like this is a war movie and he's about to convince them to go blow up a bridge. That may have been the actual plot of one of Capsicle's war movies, come to think of it. "Thor's gone back to Asgard to find out if there's anything else the healers there can do, but we can't wait for that." He looks at the four of them as if he could drill the solution out of their heads with the laser-like focus of his eyes. "So, I need to know what else we have."

"At this precise second, about sweet fuck-all minus diddly-squat," Tony says. "But," he adds before Steve's eyes actually do burn blue holes through him, "I have J.A.R.V.I.S. going through the counselors and psychologists we have on staff, compiling a list of the ones who would be best able to deal with Bucky going back to timesharing his head." He looks over at Sam. "I know you weren't in favor of that last time, but we may not have an option anymore."

Sam nods in that slow way that Tony's come to recognize means he hates the idea but he's going to agree anyway because he can't think of anything else. Tony tends to get that from him a lot. "Yeah," he says unhappily. "At least he'll be in familiar territory this time."

"Who the hell would be able to deal with this?" Clint asks the table at large. He turns to Natasha. "You know what he's gone through better than anyone. And you saw him bleeding out on the floor last night when Bucky's evil twin went apeshit on his shoulder. That's a little above the average, 'my best buddy died on the op and I can't take the guilt'."

"Barnes isn't evil," Steve says immediately.

"The S.H.I.E.L.D. psychologists helped you," Natasha says. Her voice is kind but Clint's jaw still works like he wanted to wince but aborted it.

"That was different," Clint says, and no one contradicts him.

"It's not just what Barnes did," Steve says. "It's actually worse." He ducks his head, letting it hang between his extended arms for a moment, like the weight of this thing is too much for him to deal with. But when he takes a deep breath and looks up the steel in his eyes is the same. "Bucky…wasn't there, when I went to see him after the meeting. It was the one James called Sergeant Barnes, who'd cut Bucky's arm last night. He told me that Bucky's still in there, but he's…" Steve's mouth twitches miserably. "He used the word 'quiet'. I think it means dormant, somehow. Apparently Bucky and Barnes are aware of each other and each-other's actions, but they don't communicate."

"Okay," Tony says slowly. "Then why doesn't Bucky soldier up and kick Barnes to the curb? No offence," he adds quickly when Steve really does glare at him. "I just meant, since the original Buckster knows Barnes plays with knives and is all about the home surgery, why won't he take over again? Wait—he can, can't he?" Tony blinks, just thinking of it.

Steve shakes his head, running his fingers through his hair. It's in messy spikes, and it occurs to Tony that Steve likely went right from being released from the med suite to the briefing with Coulson to the side of Bucky's bed. He looks exhausted, and Tony wonders if he's still in pain. He's not moving like he is, but that doesn't always mean much. "James said Bucky could take over, but he won't. Bucky…James told me Bucky made Sergeant Barnes when he was captured along with the surviving members of the 107th. When Zola experimented on him."

"Wait. Wait, wait," Clint cuts in. "He _made_ him? What?"

"Yeah, he made him," Steve repeats. "James said Bucky made Barnes to…deal with what was happening. So he could survive it."

"Whoa," Tony says.

"No shit," Clint murmurs.

"It's been known to happen, in cases of dissociative identity disorder. The original identity splits into separate personalities as a coping mechanism," Sam says. "Each different part becomes a way to protect the whole."

"So Bucky made James, Barnes and the Asset," Tony says. It's not a question because he doesn't expect to be wrong, so he can't help blurting, "what?" when Steve shakes his head.

"It's more complicated than that," Steve says. He takes a breath and straightens like he's about to give a fucking seminar on the convoluted brain of his boyfriend. But then he grimaces. "I feel like I should have my sketchbook."

"Seriously? You need to _diagram_ this?" Clint's gapes, then looks sharply at Natasha, who obviously kicked him under the table.

"Hey, I made a list to keep his personalities straight before," Tony says, shrugging. "J, holographic screen, please."

A transparent, blue-edge screen appears, hovering over the table in front of Steve. He nods his thanks, but pauses unhappily with his index finger about to touch. "All right. I'm pretty sure from what he told me, that James split from Bucky back in 1926. He fell…" Steve clenches his jaw. "He was pushed down the stairs by his father, who was an alcoholic creep who regularly beat the tar out of him." Steve keeps his eye on the small, rough sketch he's drawing with his finger. It's the outline of a figure that's obviously a child. It's amazing how good it looks, considering the medium and how clear Steve's anger is, in every quick, slashing line. "Everyone knew Bucky was getting beaten, but no one talked about it back then. When Bucky didn't come to school for two days I knew something bad had happened. He came back with a black eye, probably cracked ribs and just…bruises everywhere. He said he fell down the stairs, but I knew his dad did it. But he refused to be called James, after that. He was always Bucky."

Steve draws two more small Bucky-figures, then connects them to the first boy he drew with a dotted line. He writes B over one and J over the other. He glances up at Clint. "James is the one who deals with the pain when he gets hurt. I don't know how that works, since all his identities are aware of each other and their experiences. But he was adamant that it was his job to be in control when Bucky's in pain." He's still drawing as he speaks, adding three more, clearly older male figures a short distance away from the boys. "I also don't know how many times James came out again while we were growing up. There were…" he swallows. "Bucky got hurt a lot. Especially protecting me when I couldn't keep my trap shut."

"Steve," Sam says, but Steve just shakes his head and keeps talking.

"By the time I got off my star-spangled ass and joined the fighting, Bucky had already split again. When he made Sergeant Barnes." He connects the child figure with the B to two of the adult sketches, then scrawls a 'Sgt.' above the higher of the two figures and a 'Ba' over one of the lower ones. "It was Sergeant Barnes who I rescued…No, it was James who I rescued from Zola's experiments, because they were torturing him. Sergeant Barnes took over right after so we could get out. And Barnes was the identity that stayed in control until he fell out of the train." Steve carves a large 'X' through the Sgt. Figure. "James said he died." Steve hesitates, finger poised in front of the screen. "If he hadn't, I don't know if Bucky would've ever come back. Maybe when the war ended and Bucky felt safe. I don't know."

None of them mention that right now, Bucky's in danger from Barnes rather than being protected by him. But Bucky still hasn't taken over.

"I'm sorry I called him an evil twin," Clint says.

Steve flashes him a weak smile, then goes back to drawing. He adds one more figure nearer the outside of the screen. He marks it 'V', with a question mark. "I'll have to ask James who made the Winter Soldier. He didn't mention him." Steve goes back to the last remaining figure. He connects it to the boy with the 'J' over his head, then labels it 'A'. "James made the Asset, after Hydra took Bucky from the Russians." He swallows again. "Apparently what they wanted Bucky to do was so awful that James created someone who wouldn't care. James said that Bucky would have died, otherwise. He would've let them torture him to death rather than submit to their brainwashing."

"Okay, that is entirely horrible," Tony says into the ensuing silence. "I mean, I already knew it was horrible. But watching the play-by-play just makes it that much more new and excitingly horrible."

"The Red Room made the Winter Soldier," Natasha says. Everyone looks at her, but she keeps her eyes on Steve, steady through the blue screen. "The way they made their assassins was to break down their psyches entirely, then rebuild them as whatever person they wanted. I thought I was a Ballerina with the Bolshoi Ballet, until they needed me not to be." She shrugs like what was done to her and Bucky was a negligible inconvenience, which somehow only emphasizes the absolute violation of it. "It would've been that much easier with Bucky, since he had amnesia when they found him."

"It'd make sense why Hydra wouldn't want that persona, then. Just the perfect assassin who went with it," Sam says. He clears his throat. "I don't think it'll be impossible to fix this, Steve," he says to him. "There's a fair amount of literature on re-integrating dissociated identities. But the fact that one of them was imposed on Bucky, and that Barnes is actively hostile to the Asset—who hasn't reappeared yet, so at least he's still integrated as far as we know, right? Well," he goes on at Steve's tentative nod. "There's no way it will be easy. Or fast."

"I know that," Steve falls just short of snapping it. "But there's one more thing." He looks like just thinking about it is causing him pain. "James split off when Bucky was nine. He never grew up. He's still nine years old."

"Oh you have fucking got to be _kidding_ me," Tony says. "He's nine? Bucky's fucking hurt locker is _nine?_ What the hell, Sam? You didn't think that was worth mentioning?"

"Hey," Sam doesn't raise his voice, but his tone still cuts through Tony's tirade like a shout. "I didn't know that until right this second either, Tony. And I _definitely_ didn't know that when Bucky was staying at my place last year. I didn't even realize there was an age difference with James until I was with him on Asgard. And even then, I guessed James probably wasn't as old as Bucky, but I figured he was eighteen. At worst."

"Yeah, well, try half that," Tony growls. He knows he's angry at the wrong person, but Bucky's dad is long dead and there're no convenient Hydra goons to blast into oblivion. And Sam is beautifully forgiving.

"I didn't even think about it," Steve says quietly, looking down at his hands on the table. They're lit blue from the light of the holographic screen. "I mean, I _knew_. I remembered when it happened, when he refused to be called James anymore. But I didn't think about it." He lifts his head to look at Sam through the screen, but Tony doesn't know if he wants Sam's bottomless absolution or for the man to confirm his guilt. "I spoke to James, in your house and then on Asgard. I knew it was James, but I didn't think about what that meant. That he was a child. That he's been a child for Bucky's whole life."

"Why the hell would you?" Clint demands with that wonderfully incredulous bluntness of his.

"Because he's my friend," Steve says. "Because I was with him almost all the time, growing up. Because I should have noticed a God-damned little _kid_ screaming in pain. Because what the hell kind of superhero am I if I couldn't even tell something was wrong with my best friend?"

"The kind who's also human," Natasha says. "You can't really think you failed your friend by not finding something you didn't even know to look for."

"I don't know about you guys," Clint says, "but probably the last place my mind would go would be, 'hey, he has the same name my buddy used back in the day. Therefore he must be the same age now that he was when he last used it.'" He looks back at Steve. "Seriously? You think that's an obvious leap, there?"

"Blame yourself for something reasonable," Natasha says. "Like being foolish enough to let him beat you almost to death on the helicarrier."

"That worked."

Natasha arches an eyebrow. "I never said it didn't."

"Wait," Sam says. "You said that James is in control right now? The nine year-old?"

Steve nods. "I got him to push Barnes out, like he did last night."

"But he's a kid," Clint says. "How can he push Barnes around?"

"I don't know," Steve says. "I just know he can, and I don't think Barnes can take control back from him."

"So, we don't have to worry about Barnes remaking _West Side Story_ on his arm again?" Tony asks.

"I don't think so," Steve says. Tony would like it better if he looked more certain.

"Unfortunately, that's only a temporary solution at best," Sam says.

"I'm aware of that too, Sam," Steve says, and the fact he's getting techy with _Sam_ shows exactly how upset he is. Steve looks at Tony. "When will J.A.R.V.I.S. have the list of names you requested?"

Tony shrugs. "Can you send the list of S.H.I.E.L.D. counselors to my tablet, J?"

"Already done, sir." Which is one of the many reasons Tony is constantly so damn happy he built him.

"And of that list, which one would be the best qualified to help Barnes?"

"None, sir."

The response is so fast and so far from what Tony expected that for a moment he doesn't even know what he heard. "What?" he demands, a half-second after Steve and, well, everyone. "What do you mean, 'none'?"

"Just what I said, sir," and Tony would accuse J.A.R.V.I.S. of being a smartass if he couldn't hear the apologetic tone in the A.I.'s voice. "I'm afraid that none of the specialists whose curriculum vitae you requested I peruse have sufficient background or training to provide adequate aid to Sergeant Barnes."

Steve clenches his eyes shut and rubs his forehead. "Now what?" he says, and it doesn't sound like a question as much as a plea.

Captain America should never, ever sound like that.

"What about outside of S.H.I.E.L.D., then?" Natasha says.

"I'm not even sure we should trust Bucky to ex-S.H.I.E.L.D. anyway," Clint says. "What if we give Bucky's head into the safekeeping of a Hydra operative?"

"Not after my background checks," Tony murmurs, but he's thinking about something else. He stands up, walks around the table to the screen. He looks at all the little Buckies for a moment, still thinking, then grabs Bucky, James, Barnes, the Asset and Vanya. He lines them up, then erases the rest of the screen with a rapid wave of his hand. "Okay," he says, thumb over his mouth and his fingers curled around his chin as he looks at the five figures. "Steve, you said Sergeant Barnes was dead, right?" he waits for Steve's nod. Steve looks harried and still guilty and really unhappy, but he's just watching, letting Tony do his thing. "So, what brought him back to life?"

"When I got injured, last night," Steve says. "Barnes told me that when I got shot, and Bucky saw the assassin and what he did to me, Barnes was suddenly there. Not in control, but present again. Then he took over after Bucky was incapacitated. Actually, James was there, while Bucky was in pain. Then Barnes took over."

"Holy fuck," Tony says, blinking at the drawing with the 'Sgt.' label. "That was Barnes in my workshop last night, asking for a cigarette and telling me just to cut his arm off. Holy _fuck._ " He looks at Steve. "I thought he was joking, about the arm. I swear to God I thought he was joking."

"There's no reason you should've noticed anything, Tony," Steve says. His smile is like the third act of a tragedy. "He loved to smoke, during the war."

"I just thought he was tired," Tony says. He rubs his face with his hand. "Fuck. He was looking around like he didn't recognize anything and saying things that didn't make sense, and I just figured he was tired."

"Tony," Sam says, in that tone that's like a shout but isn't. Tony immediately lifts his head and looks at him. "He thought I was Gabe Jones for a second there, on top of the building. I assumed it was shock. There was no reason for us to suspect anything like a new identity."

"Hey, if I can't blame myself for James, you can't blame yourself for Barnes," Steve says, with something almost like a smile.

"It's been over a year," Natasha adds. "There was no reason for any of us to think this would happen again."

"All right," Tony says, because it's easier than arguing and it's not like he wants them to be wrong anyway. He goes back to the screen and moves Vanya, James and Bucky to the far right, then moves Barnes and the Asset closer together on the left. He taps the figure of the Asset, making blue ripples circle out from his fingertip. "These two were made by Bucky and James, which means they were both made by Bucky, for self-protection. But Barnes wants the Asset dead." He looks up at Steve. "Why? Why does Barnes have such a hate-on for the Asset, anyway? They're both all about protection, right? They should be bros."

"Barnes is obsessed with protecting me," Steve says. "He knows the Asset tried to kill me when Bucky was still under Hydra's control." He glances at Natasha when he says it, like he can't help himself. Of course then Tony can't help glancing either, but Natasha just looks inscrutable and beautiful and doesn't make another comment about Steve letting Bucky beat him to death. "So in order to protect me, he's convinced the Asset has to die. James said Barnes can't comprehend that they're all in the same body, because James created the Asset long after Barnes was dead."

Clint gives his head a quick shake. "Maybe we need another diagram."

"All right…" Tony says. "We have the three Musketeers over here: the default, otherwise known as Bucky; the emergency backup identity of Vanya the Winter Soldier; and Jimmy the kid. These,"—he draws a quick circle around them—"are the honchos. The co-stars. And they get along fine, or at least don't dislike each other. But over here,"—he circles the two other figures—"we have the soldier and the killer, both created out of desperation when the default, Bucky, would've died otherwise. But…" Tony trails off, looking from the group of three to the group of two. "Okay," he says slowly, thinking as he goes along. He's used to having everyone's attention, but the fact that his fellow Avengers are just watching, trusting him to have some kind of answer for this, is surprisingly unnerving. "I remember the Asset when we were at Sam's house. He did pretty much whatever you told him and kept asking us if we had a mission for him." He blinks, looks at Sam. "Except for the wolf-boy rage thing in the vault. You said that was him, tearing the place down."

Sam nods. "I could've been wrong. But Bucky's identities weren't as separate then as they are now. They were all bleeding into each other. Like, with him speaking Russian."

"That's true. Good point." Tony turns back to the screen. "So, the Asset. At the time, Sam thought that he'd been so brutalized that he didn't understand kindness anymore. But what if…what if he didn't have enough of a personality to understand? Like…" Tony snaps his fingers a few times, trying to think of a suitable analogy.

"Like a robot?" Steve offers.

"Yes!" Tony snaps his fingers again and points at Steve. "Like, what if James, out of desperation, made a kind of robot-Bucky who would follow orders and not care, like you said. But he created him under duress, right? So it's fast and dirty, and the Asset's not a complete identity? I made Dum-E way faster than J.A.R.V.I.S.," (and Tony isn't going to mention the desperation that went into that robot's fast and dirty creation, either. Loneliness isn't life or death, no matter what it felt like at the time) "and he's a perfectly good robot, when he's not breaking things or making toxic smoothies. But he's not an A.I. like J is. J.A.R.V.I.S. is unique."

"Thank you, sir," J.A.R.V.I.S. says.

"You said that Bucky made Sergeant Barnes while being tortured," Natasha says to Steve.

Steve nods. "But he's not like the Asset. He was so similar to Bucky I didn't know he wasn't him."

"Well, yeah," Tony says, because the more he thinks about it the more it makes sense, and he can see Steve's eyes clouding with guilt again and that is seriously worse than dead kittens, it's so bad. "He was almost exactly like Bucky because he wasn't separate enough not to be. Like, a different aspect of Bucky, but not a different Bucky."

"So?" Clint asks.

"So, what if we get rid of them?" Tony puts his fingers on the Sgt. and Asset figures and flicks them off the screen. "The other three can integrate again, just like they did before."

"Can we do that?" Steve asks him. He looks like he wants to hope but doesn't dare.

Tony shrugs. "If the Asgardians could mesh all of Bucky's memories back together, why can't they just remove some?"

"Wait." Clint holds up a hand. "Sorry to rain on the parade here, but…if Barnes is too much a part of Bucky to be a separate person or identity or whatever, how do you erase him without erasing everything else?"

Steve goes white. "I hadn't thought of that."

"The Asset might be too close to James as well," Natasha says.

"Rub in the salt, why don't you?" Tony mutters. He cards his fingers through his hair, glaring at the three figures remaining on the blue screen. "The Asset might be too close to James," he repeats. "Well, fuck."

"It was a good idea, Tony," Steve says. "There might be a way to make it work. I'll ask Thor about it when we hear from him."

"Yeah, okay," Tony says on a breath. He keeps looking at the screen as the others stand and move off. Sam asks him if he'll visit James later, and he nods, knowing J.A.R.V.I.S. will remind him. He'll bring the new arm, see what the kid thinks of it.

The kid.

Tony moves the drawing of the boy with the J above it to the center of the screen. He makes another flicking motion at the edge and the two other figures slide back on. He uses his finger to move the one of Barnes until it's overlaying the one of Bucky, then moves the figure of the Asset over James.

He stares at the amalgamation of the Asset and James for a long time.


	4. Chapter 4

"Hey, kid." Tony opens the door to Bucky's med suite room, then uses the tee-shirt-wrapped prosthetic arm to knock. He tries to be careful, but the kid startles anyway. "Sorry," Tony says, wincing.

"S'okay," James says, though it takes him a moment longer to let go of the death grip he has on the bed rail. He doesn't quite smile. "Hi, Tony."

It looks like James has showered, because his hair is damp, and he's wearing jeans and a sleeveless tee-shirt. He's eating lunch, which is a pepperoni pizza that some clever person cut so he can pick up the slices easily with just one hand. There's a glass of milk and a bowl of grapes on the tray table as well. 

Kid food. It makes Tony smile to see it. "Is it okay if I come in?" he asks, probably too late since he's inside the room. But hey, at least he remembered. "I don't want to interrupt pizza time, or anything."

James' eye-roll is remarkably adult. "You can come in. I'm almost done."

"Okay, cool." Tony grabs one of the chairs and sits next to James' left side. "How's your shoulder?" The bandage is gone already, so Tony can see a long, red line held together with black stitches. A lot of black stitches. The wound looks clean and like it's at least a week old already, but it's still a thick, ugly thing, surrounded by more red, stitched-up wounds where the surgeons had to remove the housing for Bucky's arm. Looking at it, Tony's kind of glad he hasn't had lunch yet himself. "Does it hurt?"

James shakes his head, mouth full. He swallows, then finishes the milk and wipes his mouth with the side of his hand.

"Napkin," Tony says, pointing at it.

James uses the napkin.

"It's fine," he says, once his lips are clean and his mouth is empty. He rolls his shoulder experimentally, like he's waiting for it to start hurting, but then just shakes his head. "It feels weird, though. Not having it," he says seriously. "I keep trying to get stuff and it doesn't work."

"Well, I can help you with that," Tony says. He eyes the fruit. "After you eat the grapes."

James shakes his head. "I'm full."

"I'm not letting you die of scurvy," Tony says. "Eat the grapes, or I don't show you the arm."

James glowers at him, but he takes two grapes and puts them in his mouth, then makes a big production out of eating and swallowing. "There."

"You had two," Tony says. "C'mon. I'm serious, here. Scurvy is a terrible disease. You'll lose your teeth. We'll have to mush up everything in a blender. You'll be stuck drinking Dum-E's smoothies for the rest of your life. You don't want that, do you?"

James laughs. Barely, and it sounds rusty and old, but for a moment it's there, and Tony has the sudden, brutal realization that this is probably the first time the kid's laughed since 1926.

But then James sees Tony's face and he's not smiling anymore. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing," Tony says quickly. He's sure that anyone looking at James unhappily always ended terribly for him. "Nothing's wrong at all. I was just thinking about how you have, like, six grapes left and you need to eat them."

"Two," James says.

"Six."

"Three."

"Three I can do," Tony says. "High-five for your awesome negotiating skills." He lifts the still-wrapped prosthetic arm palm-up.

James cringes.

"Shit. Shit, I'm sorry," Tony says, quickly putting the prosthetic on the bed. "I'm really, really sorry. I didn't mean to scare you. I was just fooling around. I wasn't going to hit you. I'm sorry.

"Do you want me to leave?" he says a moment later, because James hasn't moved expect for his darting eyes. "Maybe I should go. I'm sorry." He stands, slowly and carefully.

"It's okay," James says. He still looks nervous, but he sits up straight. "I want to see the arm."

"Are you sure? I'll go if you want."

"I'm sure," James says, nodding.

"Okay," Tony says. He smiles, hopes it looks sincere as opposed to worried and guilty. He sits down again.

James swings the tray table aside. Tony decides not to mention the grapes.

He unwraps the arm, dropping the shirt on the floor, then holds the arm out, moving it slowly and keeping it low to the bed. "Here. Check it out."

James takes it and puts it palm-down on his lap. He smiles a little at the shield symbol on the shoulder, then runs his fingers over the metal. "It feels different."

"Yup." Tony nods proudly. "It's lighter, for starters. Even with the housing it won't weigh any more than your right arm does. And the arm's in fewer pieces, which means it's less likely to lose any of them. Or, you know, get stuff trapped in the joints. It's stronger too, because I was able to get my hands on some adamantium. That's metal almost as strong as Steve's shield," he explains when James looks puzzled. "You'll be able to deflect pretty much anything."

"Really?" James looks at him like he's been given the coolest present ever. Which is possibly true and therefore unbelievably sad.

"Really," Tony says seriously. "But it's even better than that. Here." He snaps his fingers, remembering too late that it might startle James, but James just gives him the arm back. "Watch this."

Tony flicks the thumb, and the two panels covering the forearm snap out and unfold into a buckler. "Makes it easier to block bullets," Tony explains needlessly. He flicks the thumb again and the buckler instantly retracts.

James grins. Tony hands him the arm and lets him try it a few times. "When the arm's attached to you, all you'll have to do is think of what you want, and it'll happen. The thumb thing's just for demonstration purposes."

"It's really neat," James says. He's still grinning. "What else does it do?"

"'What else does it do?' he asks, as if that wasn't awesome enough," Tony says in mock offence. "Bend the pinkie."

James does, and a blur of color sweeps up the arm from the nail tips to the shoulder. James yelps in surprise and drops the arm. It falls onto his lap, looking remarkably like something Tony just hacked off a real person except for the lack of blood. "Wow." James picks the arm up again, examining it as he turns it in his hand. "It looks real." Even the painted shield looks like a tattoo.

"It feels real as well, and it'll stay the same temperature as the rest of your body," Tony says proudly. "You'll be able to go anywhere with that, and not have to worry about wearing gloves anymore." He can't help the satisfied grin when James looks at him all wide-eyed with excitement. "See? Didn't I tell you it'd be amazing?"

He remembers a second later that he'd told Sergeant Barnes that, not James, but the boy doesn't seem to care.

"Thank you, Tony!" he gushes, exactly like a nine-year old. Then he all but throws himself at Tony and hugs him.

"Whoa." Tony is very glad for the solidity of the plastic chairs, because he's pretty sure he'd be on his back on the floor otherwise, with the force of the kid's exuberance. He wonders if James really knows he's in an enhanced adult's body. Even with just the one arm, Tony can practically hear his ribs creaking. But he just laughs and hugs James back. It's nice hugging him, even if he's way too big. "So, I guess you like it, huh?"

"It's great," James says. He lets go and sits back on the bed, picking up the arm again. He wiggles the pinkie a few times, watching the skin color appear and disappear. He lifts it and holds it to his left shoulder, then frowns and looks at Tony. "Can I attach it?"

"Not just yet," Tony says, trying not to look at the stitches again. "You need a new housing for it, and that can't go on until your shoulder's healed." Of course, now he's actually thought about it he's wondering if it can go on at all.

"Oh," James says, crestfallen. Then he blinks and looks at Tony hopefully. "Dr. Zaccaro says she'll take the stitches out this evening before she goes home."

"That's great," Tony says. He rubs his mouth unhappily, feeling like the biggest jerk asshole in existence for not thinking of this before he got the kid's hopes up. "There's just one problem, kiddo. The new housing for the arm…I made it for Bucky."

"Oh," James says. Now he looks heartbroken, and if Steve's misery is like dead kittens, James' puppy-eyes of woe are even more terrible. "That's okay."

"Wait. That's not what I meant," Tony says quickly. He winces internally, then just says it, figuring he can't make things worse. "I just meant…the way the housing has to go on, it'll hurt. It'll hurt a lot. Not for more than a couple minutes, but…it attaches itself to you by kind of…growing into your shoulder. It's fast, but it'll hurt." Most of Cybertek's Deathlok stuff is crap, but some of their cybernetics were worth reverse-engineering, like how they assimilate with the body almost instantly. "I said the arm's housing was for Bucky because he's a grownup. And I didn't want you to be in pain." _Yet again,_ he thinks.

James blinks at him again, this time in confusion. "I'm the one who gets hurt."

"I know," Tony says, pleased that he can keep his voice matter-of-fact about it. "But…" He trails off because he was going to say, 'you weren't supposed to be here', and there's no way he can do that. "But I don't want you to," he says instead. It's true anyway. "You've gotten hurt enough, James. I thought this time Bucky should take it. He can handle it," Tony adds, because James looks scared for no reason he can name. "He's a grownup. And he's brave, like you. It's okay for him to get hurt sometimes."

James' eyes well with tears. "He can't get hurt. He'll die."

"Oh, Jesus," Tony murmurs, because the kid is crying and it's bad enough when Pepper cries, but James is a little kid and Tony is so not equipped to deal with this it's not even funny. "Don't. Please don't cry. It's all right." He rubs James' back, wondering if he should hug him again or if that would just freak him out. The teddy bear in the Captain America uniform that Clint brought is at the foot of the bed. Tony grabs it and doesn't entirely shove it at the kid's chest. "No one's dying, okay? Bucky's fine. You don't have to worry about him. He's, um, quiet, back there. Right?"

James nods, sniffing and hugging the bear.

"Yeah. So. He's fine. He's fine, you're fine…no one's getting hurt and no one's going to die. So you don't have to cry, okay? I promise, no one's going to be hurt."

James nods. He sniffs again, swallows. "What about the housing?"

"Forget the housing," Tony says. "I'll figure out a way to attach it to you without it hurting, all right? Hey, maybe the doc could inject your shoulder with something, freeze it up for…okay, we won't do that," he amends at James' almost frantic headshaking.

"No needles," James says. He clutches the bear, looking wild-eyed.

"No needles," Tony repeats. "Absolutely." He sighs, rubbing his face with his hand. "I'm sorry. All I keep doing is scaring you or making you cry." He reaches across the bed to snag the remaining napkin, remembering to move slowly. He uses it to clean James' face so the kid doesn't have to let go of the bear. "I'm sorry," he says again. "I'll talk to the docs. We'll figure something out, all right?" He wrenches up a smile. "I promise you'll get to use your awesome new arm."

"Thank you," James says. He rubs his forehead, grimacing. "My head hurts."

"Yeah, crying will do that," Tony says. "I'm really sorry."

"It's okay." James' smile's a little wet. "Thank you for the arm."

"You're welcome, kiddo." Tony stands up, figuring he should leave before he makes James cry again or gives him an aneurysm or something. "Um, do you want me to leave it?"

James nods, looking marginally happier. "Yeah. Thank you."

"Not a problem," Tony says. "I'll see you later, okay? You should probably take a nap, before anyone makes you eat more grapes."

"I'm nine. Naps are for babies," James grouses. He tucks the bear next to him and picks up the arm, flicking the buckler in and out.

"One day when you're an adult, you're going to miss naps _so much_ ," Tony says. "Seriously. Naps are awesome."

"Naps are for babies," James repeats. He rubs his head again, then lifts the arm and waves with it. "Bye, Tony."

"Later, kiddo," Tony says.

It's only when he's back in his workshop, circled by holographic schematics for the arm housing—he'd still prefer to just make it painless—that he realizes James won't ever be an adult. Somehow, despite the strength and height and obviously adult body, Tony completely forgot that James is part of Bucky, and not a completely separate person.

He thinks he should probably feel stupid about that, but all he feels is sad.

He shoves the schematics aside, then for no good reason he draws a picture of a boy. He's as good an artist in his own way as Steve, though he's always used his talent for blueprints and diagrams instead of portraits and landscapes. His James-figure looks a bit more like the Iron Man suit than a child, but it's not like anyone else is going to see it.

When Tony realizes that he's vaguely contemplating making a robot body for a child who doesn't actually exist, he scowls at himself then crumples the picture and shoves it into the virtual trash can. He snatches the arm housing schematics back and rearranges them, trying to get his head back into the redesign.

But it's very hard to concentrate.

* * *

"I told you this would happen if you coddled him too much. There was a reason the previous Asset was always wiped and kept in cryostasis between missions. The programming starts breaking down after 72 hours, and Ward has consistently been out far longer than that." Dr. Meier gestures at him. "This is exactly what happened to the first one—he attacked his own people too."

Agent Taylor doesn't answer. She walks the few steps from Meier to where Ward is, laying on the table that they normally use when he requires medical attention rather than punishment. He certainly requires punishment, but not until he's adequately healed. The last thing she wants is to waste more time waiting for him to recuperate.

"Maybe we should do that," she says, looking down at him. Ward stares up at her with eyes that are glassy and enormous with fear. He's pale and sheened with perspiration, which is likely from both fear and pain. At least with the chest tube and the oxygen cannula he's no longer in danger of expiring. Taylor wasn't looking forward to the prospect of explaining to Ms. Schmidt that they needed to find another Asset after less than a year and a half. Especially since they no longer have an inside man at S.H.I.E.L.D. to funnel them his protégé.

John Garrett had made a fine choice with this one. Taylor only regrets that he hadn't lived long enough to see the fruit of his efforts.

Then again, he might well have been disappointed. She certainly is. "I'm trying to help you, Ward," she says, keeping her face neutral and her voice calm. Terror has its place, but just like any animal he always responds best when she's gentle with him. "No one wants to hurt you again, especially after what you went through yesterday night. But you know we have to, since Captain Rogers and the S.H.I.E.L.D. agents are still alive." She lifts her hand to pet his hair but aborts the motion. Taylor still thinks that a caress first makes the slap more effective, but she won't encourage his recalcitrance. "And you attacked your handlers, in order to help the agents escape. Your own handlers. That's unforgivable. You know that, don't you?" 

Ward nods, looking stricken. He hates disappointing her. "I know. I'm sorry."

"I'm sure you are," she says. He sure as hell will be. "But that doesn't change what you did. You can start to make up for it, though, by telling me why you left them alive."

His punishment will be just as bad regardless of what he tells her, of course. There's no way he can make up for this; he can only be retrained. But he's always responded well to hope.

"They knew me," he says.

"Be precise, Ward," Taylor says, putting a trace of ice in her voice. She crosses her arms as she looks down at him. "Who knew you? The agents? Rogers? Why are they alive? Answer the question."

He swallows, and his breathing speeds up. "Rogers," he says, and she can practically see the erratic grind of his thoughts as he tries to explain. Her one regret about the programming is that it renders the products so inarticulate. "He—he _saw_ me. He…knew what I was."

"Oh we know that," Taylor says mildly. She nods at the restraint table, where she put his goggles and his blood-spattered facemask, which they found in the S.H.I.E.L.D. agents' car. "We know he saw your face. And we will deal with that. But did he recognize you? Did he know your face from before?"

Ward finally seems to understand what kind of answer she expects from him. "I don't know. He…He saw I'm like the other one."

"You mean, he saw that you resemble the one you fought?"

Ward nods.

"Are you sure that's all it was?" Taylor makes her voice sharp. "Did he speak to you? Did he use a name?"

Ward goes even paler at her tone, but he shakes his head. "No."

"Ah." That's a relief. Bad enough that Rogers saw any part of Ward's face. If he'd actually recognized him from S.H.I.E.L.D., that could've led to problems down the line. Rogers would never abandon one of his own.

"Why…do I look like him?"

Taylor's not surprised he wants to know why he looks like the Winter Soldier, but she'll ignore the question until she can think of an answer that will work to her advantage. "So, Rogers saw that you look like one of his teammates. Is that why you failed your mission?"

He actually cringes at the words, which is good, but then his expression goes vague. "No. I…He…" Ward looks at her helplessly. "He's good."

"The previous Asset was punished every time he showed hesitation," Meier apparently feels compelled to make the interjection. "Or if he made any indication of recognizing or having opinions about the target." She looks at Ward, shaking her head in disapproval. "You can't keep treating him this gently and then expect him to perform."

"The original Asset broke his programming completely the instant he was sent against Rogers," Taylor snaps at her. "But if you think you can get a better result than Pierce, then by all means go ahead and reacquire him."

Meier returns Taylor's cold stare with an equally hostile one of her own. "I recommended it, right after he disappeared. When we still had the resources available to find him," she sniffs. "But Ms. Schmidt didn't want to expend the time or effort when there was every indication that one look at Captain America would undo his training all over again."

"You think she was wrong about that?" Taylor asks. Part of her is genuinely curious whether Meier would be willing to contradict Synthia Schmidt in front of this facility's senior agent.

"What I thought at the time is no longer relevant," Meier says, neatly sidestepping the question. "If we reacquired the original now, regardless of the efficacy of the retraining, we both know that the Avengers would destroy Hydra completely while they searched for him." Her smile is both wry and bitter. "And they wouldn't stop even after they found him."

"No, they wouldn't," Taylor agrees. She turns back to Ward, making her voice gentle again. "But you're no hero, returned from the dead. You're no one's beloved friend. You're just a lost little boy so desperate for love that you betrayed the only ones who actually cared about you.

"But I care about you. You've been such a good soldier, Ward. You've done everything I needed you to, until this. Do you remember what I told you? About why your mission was so important?"

He nods, panting. "I remember. I'm sorry."

"Not sorry enough, I fear," Taylor says. She indulges herself and touches his cheek, thinking that it's time for the caress. She smiles when he turns his face into her palm. "You're going to be punished," she says sadly. "I know you know that. I can't prevent it, not after what you did. But you still have the ability to choose how bad it is. I won't take that away. I don't want to have to hurt you badly. I hate hurting you," she lies easily. "So, can you explain why you helped the agents escape?"

He's breathing fast enough now that Taylor's slightly concerned that his healing lung won't be able to keep up with it. She glances at Meier, who wordlessly comes over and raises his supply of oxygen. "They knew me."

Taylor narrows her eyes. "You've said that. Tell me what that means."

"They knew me," he says, all but whispering. His eyes, when he looks at her, are full of bewildered awe. "They knew my name."

She pulls her hand away, leans over him. "What did they call you? What name?"

He swallows, helplessly pinned under her gaze. "Ward."

"I see," she says, then turns away from him, considering. It's possible that the women know him from the Academy or the Hub or another part of S.H.I.E.L.D., but it's far more likely that they're both from Coulson's team.

That's even worse than Rogers recognizing him would have been. Coulson, she knows because Garrett told her, is a very sentimental man. He's harsher now than he used to be, less forgiving, but he's still sentimental. He may have been content to let Ward be tortured for information in a military prison, but Taylor knows Coulson will be damned if he lets anyone else do it.

Factor into that how Ward attempted to assassinate Coulson's beloved Captain America, and she has no doubt whatsoever that the S.H.I.E.L.D. agent is already looking for him.

And if Ward was on Coulson's team with these women, then the only reasonable conclusion is that Meier's right and his programming really is breaking down. Because he must have recognized them on some level. Why else would he have attacked his handlers to let them go?

She spins back to him. "Were they looking for you?" When his only response is uncertainty she puts the heel of her hand over the place where Meier inserted the drainage tube and presses down. She keeps her hand there even after he cries out, but he knows better than to move away from the pain. "Were they looking for you?"

"I don't know," he gasps, "I-I don't…" He groans. "Please…"

Taylor presses harder. "That's not an answer, Ward. Were they looking for you?"

He arches his neck, moaning in pain. "I…don't know." He's struggling to breathe, and the blue tinge has returned to his lips. "I don't know. I'm…sorry. Stop…Please."

She lifts her hand all at once and he cries out again, then just lies there with his chest heaving.

"There you are." Taylor smiles, stroking his forehead. "Shh, shh. It's over. It's all over, my poor, brave boy. I know it hurt. I'm sorry I had to do that, but I needed an answer."

That's not good news, she thinks. If S.H.I.E.L.D.'s already tracking Ward, she'd be wise to euthanize him before they abandon the facility. Otherwise the risk is too great that they'll find him again. As it is, they'll have to leave. "How soon can he travel?" she asks Meier.

Meier purses her lips. "With adequate food and rest, he would've healed already. As is, perhaps another four to six hours. Ideally six. We could move him now, but I wouldn't recommend it. There's too much risk of the drain coming out, or of exacerbating his head injury." 

"And if we put him in cryostatis first?"

Meier cocks her head. "The risk there would be the physical toll of reviving him." She shrugs. "He'll probably need a few days to recuperate, but the possibility of permanent damage is minimal."

"Good." Taylor nods. "Prepare him for cryostatis transport."

Meier frowns. "You know what the S.O.P. is for compromised agents."

"He's not an agent, and he's not compromised," Taylor says. She checks her watch, partially to hide her expression. It's two in the morning. "It'll take an hour to get this place packed up," she says. "That'll have to be enough to ready him for cryo." She glances at Ward, who looks back at her with his huge, liquid darks eyes. "The new facility won't be nearly as nice as here, unfortunately." She smiles. "But then again, you've been in far worse places."

It's a pitiable, how obvious it is that he wants to understand.

Meier puts her hands on her hips. "Don't pretend you don't know what I'm talking about." She nods her chin in Ward's direction. "He's slipping his leash and he may have been tracked here. Either of those are reasons enough for cutting the rope. I can do it right now. He won't even feel anything, if that's what you're worried about."

"If you so much as touch him without my approval, I will kill you," Taylor says. It's the tone of voice that makes Ward cringe, and Meier looks at her with the same kind of fear. "He said he didn't know if he was tracked to the secondary rendezvous. It's just as possible that the S.H.I.E.L.D. agents were looking for more centipedes and found him by accident."

"You can't really—"

"And we'll begin retraining as soon as we're set up in the new facility," Taylor speaks right over her. "I'll take your recommendations under consideration."

Meier scowls. "Let me implant a failsafe, then, for God's sake. We need some kind of contingency in case he's captured."

Taylor hesitates, but it's not an unreasonable solution. And even if the failsafe is…available, it doesn't have to be used. "Fine," she says. "You can do that at the new facility."

Meier nods, clearly pleased but schooling her features. "And at the absolute least, from now on you should have him wiped after every mission."

"I agree. We'll implement that as well." It's not that different from what Taylor was doing anyway, though she still thinks it makes more sense for the Asset to be able to learn from his missions, rather than begin each one as a blank slate. But Meier looks satisfied with her concessions, which means she won't have to worry about the doctor going over her head to Schmidt.

But Taylor is not going to kill Ward for a mere _possibility_. She put in a lot of work to make him tractable. She likes that he's afraid of her, but that he retains just enough personality to occasionally be defiant. It makes it more satisfying to keep him in line. And she finds his innocence endearing.

Maybe she really will lessen his punishment this time, once they've reestablished themselves. After all, it's not like he'll know the difference. And he does always respond well to hope.

* * *

Sergeant Barnes' eyes snap open as soon as the duty nurse shuts the door to his room. He can tell by the dark and the silence that it's around 2:00 am. He's been awake for at least a half hour, pretending to sleep, waiting for the nurse to come by to check on James.

Now he has at least another half hour before the next check. Perfect.

Barnes eases out of the bed, pleased he doesn't have to worry about any of the monitoring equipment. His left shoulder itches a little where the doc took the stitches out before James went to sleep, but otherwise it feels fine. His head still hurts like someone's pounding around with a sledge hammer in there, but he can ignore that. He's had worse; this isn't close to bad enough for James to deal with.

The nurses gave James a pair of scrub pants to sleep in. Barnes takes a minute to get back into the jeans he was wearing during the day. Not for modesty, it'll just be easier to do what he has to without worrying about the drawstring coming undone or the thin material ripping.

Once he's dressed he pads silently to the counter and grabs a roll of medical tape out of the cupboard, then uses it to hold the new arm on his back. Doing it one-handed is rugged as hell. He has to hold the fingers in his teeth and dangle it over his shoulder; he feels like an idiot. But eventually Barnes rigs up something that'll allow him to move without dropping the thing.

Then he climbs onto the counter so he can reach the ceiling panel with the vent in it, and carefully lifts it and slides it aside. Then he takes a breath, crouches, and jumps.

If attaching the arm to his back was rugged, getting into the ventilation shaft silently is damn near impossible with just the one arm. He can't help making noise when his foot swings into the door of the cupboard, but at least it's a small bang instead of a huge crash. Once he's managed to yank his feet inside he waits, listening, but no one comes.

He exhales silently in relief, then carefully replaces the ceiling panel. It's not like they won't know he's missing, but it might buy him a few minutes if they think he went out the door.

Crawling in the narrow space is no picnic either with just one arm, but he has plenty of memories of how to do it. Just not his own.

Barnes fucking hates that.

The little booger's still sleeping, which is good. It'll make what Barnes is planning a lot easier, and the poor kid's exhausted anyway. Barnes isn't even sore at him for shoving him away before, since he was just doing what Steve wanted. Barnes never could say no to the guy himself when they were kids.

Bucky's awake, sort of. The way he feels reminds Barnes too much of coming out of the ice. Like, being almost aware of what was going on but too dopey to do anything about it. He's not in pain though, at least, and he's not scared or nothing. And he's safe, 'cause Barnes is looking out for him anyhow. 'Til he's ready to take the lead again.

Barnes can feel Vanya, too, like a sore tooth you don't want to poke at but can't stop doing it. He knows that's where the memories of defrosting come from: Vanya and the Asset, though Barnes sure as _fuck_ doesn't want to think about him. But if Bucky's like coming out of the ice, Vanya's frozen solid. James could probably thaw him, but there's no need.

Vanya's a dangerous fuck anyway, no one you'd want around a kid. Barnes can appreciate him, the way you appreciate a tiger or a weapon. He knows the Ruskie's done a lot of bad things—really fucking bad things—but he's also kept James and Bucky safe, and Barnes has a lot of time for him 'cause of that. He's got no beef with Vanya.

But he can feel the Asset in there too, behind James but not frozen the way Vanya is. And not quiet like Bucky. The Asset is _writhing_ in there, like some kind of maggot trying to dig its way out of cold ground. He's been doing that ever since James stepped up the night before, probably 'cause the poor kid's so scared. James is the only one and the only thing the Asset gives a shit about, but if he breaks loose all hell's gonna break loose with him.

Barnes won't let that happen. No fucking way.

He reaches the first junction and goes left, mentally mapping the building from what Bucky knows. He and Clint and Nat go in here all the time. Hell, Tony designed the tower to purposely have these crawl spaces so the Avengers could use them to sneak around if they have to. Dropping the three floors to Tony's workshop is going to be interesting one-handed, but at least he's sure that he's not going to put a knee wrong and go crashing through someone's ceiling.

"Excuse me, Sergeant, but I have explicit instructions to alert the tower if you attempt to leave the medical suite without supervision."

The voice comes outta nowhere and it's only the decades of stealth practice that stop Barnes from jumping out of his skin. He keeps forgetting about the damn robot, maybe since it's still the most science-fiction thing in a place where it's like everything's right out of _Amazing Stories_ magazine.

His heart's still thumping like a gat, but J.A.R.V.I.S. called him 'Sergeant', and that gives him an idea. One thing he knows from Bucky is that the robot's ace in a lot of stuff but he's a real knucklehead in others. "I'm not Sergeant Barnes. I'm Vanya Ivanovich," Barnes says, putting on a Russian accent. He doesn't know Russian, but all the others do thanks to Vanya, which makes faking it no sweat.

He can practically hear the robot trying to work out if he needs to alert people if it's Vanya skipping out on the docs instead of Barnes. Barnes keeps moving, figuring that he'll at least be closer to the workshop if J.A.R.V.I.S. decides to rat him out.

But the robot says, "My apologies, Mr. Ivanovich. Have a good night," and shuts off or goes somewhere else or whatever the hell he does.

Barnes grins to himself and keeps going.

Then he hits the shaft going down to Tony's workshop.

It wouldn't exactly be a swell time anyway, but Barnes is blindsided by how fucking terrified he is just looking down to where the ventilation shaft disappears into the dark. It's like he can feel the freezing air rushing over him and the metal of the door handle, getting colder under his fingers and rattling with the speed of the train. _And Steve reaches for him but the handle breaks and he—_

—Shoves himself away from the shaft opening, back onto the solid floor underneath him, biting his tongue so he won't scream. He's shaking like a little kid, like James after he gets hurt. And he's so scared he almost retreats, almost lets James take over just so he won't have to deal with it.

But he ain't some fucking pansy-assed coward who'd force a little kid to do an adult's job. And he knows anyhow that if he lets James get in front of him, he'll be done. The kid won't let him out again. He'll have to wait until the booger's asleep before he can even try, and James ain't stupid. He'll make sure he gets strapped to the bed again, no question.

Can't have that.

Barnes wishes he could just trade off with Bucky, but even a not-so-gentle shove at him just gets him the sense of a hibernating bear. Fuck you too, Bucky.

All right. All right. He tightrope-walked across a fucking fire on a beam that slipped when he got halfway to the other side and broke before he reached it. He ziplined onto the top of a moving train. He used to climb trees like a monkey with his sniper rifle on his back. He can climb down three floors into the fucking basement. He can.

Only, turns out he can't.

He put the arm on his back to keep from socking himself in the jaw when he jumped into the ventilation shaft, but that means he can't press his back against the shaft wall and hold himself there with his feet. And moving the arm to his front in the small space just isn't feasible.

That leaves trying to spider-walk down the shaft with only one hand.

Barnes carefully lowers himself into the shaft, bracing his bare feet on either side to hold himself up. He keeps his eyes fixed on the wall in front of him, but it doesn't really help. It's not like he doesn't know what's just below him: one fuck of a long way to fall.

But with only one hand he can't brace his upper body the way he can his legs, and he's so damn scared he can't concentrate and he's less than one floor down when his foot slips and he's falling.

He screams, can't help it. Even inside and in the narrow space it's too much like the mountain. Too much like watching Steve's face and the train and safety and _life_ disappearing above him and for a second he's back there and _OhGodStevehelpI'msorryI'mscaredgoingtodie_ and then almost by accident his hand snags an intersecting shaft and he nearly pulls his right shoulder out of its socket, but he stops.

Barnes hangs there, heart banging so hard it feels like its convulsing. His arm hurts and his fingers are slipping, but he's able to pull himself up into the shaft. He lies on his side on the thick, solid metal, breath sobbing out of him in relief and the knife-edged remnants of fear.

It feels like forever before he's able to gulp enough air that his heart stops thumping like it's going to drill out of his chest. He's shaking so bad it takes a couple tries before he's able to get onto his one hand and knees. But it's easier after that.

He looks through the next vent he comes to. It's not the workshop, damn it, but the level above. Barnes moves the panel and jumps lightly down onto the floor anyway.

He takes the fucking elevator.

* * *

Tony sleeps better these days than he did after the Battle of New York. But sometimes, when Pepper's not home and something reminds him just how much truly awful shit he's got tumbling around in his head (like, say, everything yesterday evening), it's just…easier, to stay in his workshop with his music blasting, building things or tweaking designs or just fucking around with ideas he'll probably never make.

Right now, for example, Tony finally abandoned the (completely useless) attempts at the redesign on Bucky's new arm housing to get it to attach painlessly. Now he's working on fixing the overheating problem with Sam's wings.

Now _that_ is going beautifully. It's still only holographic at this point, but all he has to do is shift some things around and Sam won't have to worry about getting char-broiled the next time he has to rescue James—

Bucky, damn it.

Tony huffs an annoyed laugh at himself. Considering how much it pisses him off when Bucky calls him 'Howard', it'd be pretty ironic if Tony can't stop calling him 'James'. He knows firsthand just how much of a hate-on Bucky has for what that name represents.

And it's not like Tony can't tell the difference between the adult and the kid. Actually, that might be the problem. It's too easy to tell the difference. Too easy to think of James as a nine-year old in a too-big body. But he's not.

He's not. James is a construct, a coping mechanism, a symptom of a disorder. He's not an actual little boy. Once they figure out how to put Bucky together again for realsies James will disappear.

Tony knows that's a good thing. He likes Bucky. Likes him a lot, in fact. And sure, maybe he likes James too, for a stubborn rugrat who won't eat his grapes. But the last thing Tony wants is for Bucky to stay in some kind of hellish limbo where his body gets randomly hijacked by fragments of his own mind.

Definitely the last thing, especially when one of those fragments is hell-bent on well-intentioned murder/suicide without actually being aware of the suicide part. Not to mention walking through the doors into the workshop right this second.

"Hi," Tony says, after they've had the requisite, 'Oh, fuck' moment where Barnes realizes the workshop's not empty and Tony realizes that unfortunately it's not James getting creative with the medical tape; but the same guy who almost impaled him with a screwdriver the night before.

"I need the arm housing," Barnes says, unwrapping the medical tape from around his upper body. He turns a little, so that when enough of the tape is undone the prosthetic arm clunks onto the table instead of the floor.

"J.A.R.V.I.S.," Tony says, because two can play non-sequitur, "please turn the music off and tell me why Sergeant Barnes is standing here without you, you know, having told anybody?"

"Your instructions were to alert the Avengers if Bucky Barnes left the medical suite without supervision, sir," J.A.R.V.I.S. says. "This is Vanya Ivanovich."

"Are you fucking kidding me?" Tony demands incredulously at the ceiling. "Did the fact that 'Vanya' here has the _exact same_ physical dimensions and physiology to Bucky Barnes not clue you in that it was, hey, Bucky Barnes? Do I have to worry about the next Hydra operative getting in here because they can fake an accent? What the hell, J?"

"My apologies, sir. I hadn't encountered a similar circumstance previously. I will immediately reconfigure my security protocols."

Tony plants his hands on his hips, shaking his head. "Yeah. You go do that. Seriously, don't come back until you can actually do better than a metal detector at an airport. Jesus, I am _so disappointed_ in you right now." 

"Yes, sir. Pardon me, sir. I will alert you when the reconfiguration is complete."

"Yeah, fine. Go on. Get out of here." Tony heaves an irritated sigh. "All right," he says to Barnes, who's just been standing there looking kind of annoyed, impatient and smirky all at the same time. "Let me guess—you expected to come in here, slap on the new housing and then use both arms to kill the Asset. Am I right?"

Barnes looks like he'd be crossing his arms if he had two of them. Instead he puts his hand on his hip. Now he just looks annoyed and impatient. "You know I can't give him another chance to rub Steve out, Stark. He almost killed him already."

"Ooh, we're using last names, huh? Must be serious." Tony takes a breath. "I hear you, Barnes. I really do. Hell, I saw the Asset in action and he is one terrifying son of a bitch even when he's not actually trying to rip anyone's head off. But I can't let you kill him."

Barnes glares at Tony like he's at the wrong end of a rifle scope. "I ain't asking your permission. I just want the fucking housing for the arm."

"I know," Tony says. He starts rounding the long lab table. He has no illusions about his ability to take Barnes even one-handed, but maybe he can slow him down.

And God, he's an idiot. "J.A.R.V.I.S., call—"

That's as far as he gets before he's face-down on the table with his right hand wrenched so far up his back that he's practically touching his neck. One of Barnes' knees is grinding into his kidney.

"I don't want to hurt you, Stark," Barnes says. "All I want is the housing. Where is it?"

"You…unf…know this _is_ actually hurting me, right?"

"You gonna squeal if I let you go?"

"No," Tony groans, partially just in frustration at how stupid he was not to have J.A.R.V.I.S. immediately holler for everyone, instead of wasting time chewing him out for letting Barnes leave the med suite.

Barnes lets him up and Tony glares at him, rubbing his arm. "Thanks for dislocating my shoulder, asshole."

"Where's the housing?"

"You do know that the Asset exists because of James, right?" Tony says instead of answering. "I mean, he told Steve he _made_ him, to protect him and Bucky. Just like you."

Barnes' expression goes murderous. "You sayin' I'm like him?"

"Only in a good way!" Tony backs up, putting his hands up with the palms out. "I only mean that he looks after them too. James _made_ him, Sergeant. Doesn't that mean anything to you?"

Barnes advances on him. "I'm trying to protect Steve!"

"By hurting a child?"

That actually seems to pull Barnes up short. "Are you nuts? I'd never hurt James." He looks away, to a distant part of the workshop. "You know that, don't you?" he says. "I'd never hurt you."

"Okay, that's weird," Tony says. "Were you just talking to James?"

"Yeah," Barnes says like it's obvious.

Tony blinks, glances at the corner of the room again even though he knows it's empty. "He's uh, there?"

"Yeah, he woke up." 

"Um. Don't take this the wrong way," Tony says. "But if he's awake, why are you still here?"

"Because I'm not letting him shove me out again," Barnes says. "Not until I've done what I have to." He winces and ducks his head, rubbing his temple the way he did the night before when he said he had a headache. But his eyes are like chips of ice when he looks at Tony again. "Nothing's going to happen to James," he snarls. "But if you don't give me that damn housing I'm gonna beat you to death with my fucking left arm."

"Okay! Okay! I will, I promise. I just…" Tony still has his hands up, decides to keep them there. He's almost certain that Barnes wouldn't really beat him to death. Almost totally certain. "Can I ask you something?"

"What?" Barnes keeps on snarling.

"What happens after the Asset's dead?"

Barnes shrugs with his remaining shoulder. "Bucky takes over and me and James go behind him 'til he needs us."

"Okay," Tony says, thinking quickly. "But, why can't you and James just…reintegrate with Bucky? Um, become part of him again, I mean, instead of going behind him," he elaborates when Barnes just stares at him.

"I am Bucky," Barnes says.

"Oh, sweet crying Jesus, you know what I mean!" Tony snaps. "Even you know there's the other Bucky, for fuck's sake. That's what I'm talking about. You and James—and the Asset—got, um, broken off from the other Bucky, before. When he needed you. So, why can't you just…go back in?"

"I'm not leaving the Asset in there," Barnes says. 

"Right. No Asset." Tony nods quickly. "I get it. But, what about you and James, then? Wouldn't you like to be…all together? Instead of just pieces? You know?"

"Sure." Barnes nods seriously. "It'd be easier to look after 'em, like that. But James isn't part of Bucky. He can't be. He's the one who keeps the pain."

"But he's a kid. How can you protect him if he's the one who has to get hurt all the time?"

"It's his job," Barnes says, like that's as obvious as the kid standing in the corner was. "You think I _like_ that, you little booger?" he says to the nothing that is apparently somehow James. Tony wishes he could see him too. "You think I wouldn't take it from you, if I could?" He heaves a breath of resigned frustration, rubbing his hand over his face. "I would," he says simply when he looks up at Tony. "I'd give my right arm, if it meant I could get all the pain instead of him. But I can't. That ain't the way it works."

"Why can't you?" Tony asks, genuinely bewildered. "If you and James became part of Bucky again, then you'd be able to share the pain anytime you got hurt. It wouldn't have to be him."

"That ain't the way it works," Barnes repeats a little more forcefully, like Tony's the one with the comprehension problem. "James can't be part of Bucky because he takes over when we get hurt bad enough. He keeps the pain. It's his _job._ "

"Okay," Tony says, giving up. "What about Vanya, then? Could Vanya integrate?"

Barnes shrugs. "Yeah. I think he's kinda done that already. He's silent."

Tony blinks. "You mean, like, quiet but…"

"Silent," Barnes repeats.

"Quieter," Tony finishes. He rubs the back of his head. "Seriously, the last time I had a conversation like this I was in danger of alcohol poisoning."

"You asked," Barnes says coolly. He rubs his temple again, obviously clenching his jaw.

"Are you okay?"

"Just give me the housing, Stark."

"One more question, I promise," Tony says quickly. "What if James weren't there? I mean, what if he was somewhere safe and warm and good and happy," he amends even more quickly at Barnes' expression, "just, not with you and Bucky and Vanya. What about then? Would the rest of you be able to become part of Bucky again?"

"Not unless the Asset was dead."

"Right," Tony says on a breath. "You're like Inigo Montoya, you know that? Never mind," he huffs when Barnes just looks annoyed. His memory flashes back to the blue holographic screen and the drawing of James with the Asset superimposed over it. "All right, for shits and giggles…since James made the Asset, what happens to the Asset if James is somewhere else?"

"That's another fucking question."

Tony rolls his eyes. "You've met me, right? Oh, stop it with the damn death glare, Oscar the Grouch. Yes, it's one more lousy question. Just answer it."

"I don't know, all right?" Barnes snaps. Then his mouth kind of screws up while he thinks about it. "If James was safe and not hurting anymore…the Asset'd probably join up with the kid again. Just like I would with Bucky."

"And you're okay with that? Rejoining?" 

"Sure," Barnes says, nodding. He looks wistful, like it's something he wouldn't just be okay with, but that it's something he truly wants but figures he's never going to get. Tony's surprised for a second, then feels incredibly stupid for being surprised. Of course Barnes would want to be reintegrated with Bucky. He _is_ Bucky, just like he keeps saying.

"How about the Asset?" Tony asks, unable not to despite how obviously he's completely worn out Barnes' patience.

Barnes snorts. "Like I give a shit."

Tony blinks. "Right. Okay. Thank you. We'll figure this out, Bucky," he says seriously. "We'll find a way to make you whole again." He puts his hand on Barnes' arm, wanting to offer some comfort.

Barnes yanks his arm away. "All I need you to find is the fucking housing."

Tony wordlessly goes over to his cabinet, unlocks it with his hand print, and then pulls out the housing. He takes it over to Barnes, but hesitates. "I need to warn you," he says, "putting this on is going to hurt."

"I know," Barnes says like it's no big deal. "The runt told me. He said it was going to be fine."

Tony, despite himself, can't help his shocked glance at the corner where James is not standing. He licks his lips. "Uh, sure. Okay, then. You should be sitting down, though."

Barnes sits down on the nearest stool, back straight so Tony has easy access to the stump of his left shoulder. Tony has a passing curiosity as to how Barnes thought he was going to put it on by himself. "Stay still. The full attachment will take a couple minutes."

"Just do it already," Barnes says.

Tony takes a breath, glances at the corner again. "You sure? 'Cause it may hurt more than you think."

"Stark," Barnes says warningly.

"Okay, okay," Tony says. He swallows. "I'm sorry." He fits the housing against Barnes' shoulder.

And Barnes screams.

Tony thinks he can see the moment when James muscles his way forward. It's like a flicker of vacancy goes through Barnes' eyes, though it's nothing Tony could really describe or explain. But then James turns and grabs for him and Tony hauls the shaking little boy into his arms and holds him for the longest two minutes of his life, murmuring useless stupidities like _it's okay, it's okay, you'll be all right,_ over and over again.

"Oh, God, oh, God, I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry, James," Tony starts the instant James sags against him when it's finally over. "Why did you do that? That was so stupid, so incredibly stupid. You knew it was going to hurt—why did you let me hurt you like that? You poor kid. I'm so sorry I hurt you. I'm sorry." He knows he's babbling, rocking James in his arms like he's far younger than nine. James is clutching Tony with his right arm so hard that Tony's sure he'll have bruises, but he really doesn't give a damn.

James is the first one to let go.

"I'm not stupid," he says fiercely, wiping his eyes. "I knew it was going to hurt. You said so."

"Yes I did," Tony says. He looks around for anything that's clean enough to use as a tissue, then blinks in surprise when Dum-E comes trundling up with a not-completely grease covered rag in his claw. "Thank you," Tony says, mindful of how Barnes didn't like it when he was brusque with the robot.

James takes the rag and Dum-E clicks his claw as if he's saying 'you're welcome'.

"I told you it was going to hurt a lot," Tony says while James more-or-less cleans his face with the cloth. "That's why I don't get why you told Barnes it wasn't…" He stops, mouth open. "Oh," he says softly. He stares at James. "You lied to him."

James nods, sniffling. He wipes his nose then puts the rag on the table. He rubs his temple like Barnes did, like his head hurts. Tony's not surprised. "I had to. I knew what he was going to do."

Tony runs his fingers through his hair. "I guess it was pretty bad, huh?"

James nods again. "He was going to knock you out, once he had his arm. Not, um, badly," he adds, like he doesn't want to slander him. "Then he was going to steal one of your cars so he could get to where he wanted before anyone could stop him."

"And that would be?" Tony asks. He knows he won't like the answer.

"A gun store," James says. "'Cause we can't get into the armory here."

"Oh, fuck," Tony says softly. "He was going to shoot himself?"

"Uh-huh. In the head," James says, sober and wide-eyed. He looks at Tony pleadingly. "It's not his fault. He doesn't know. He thought he could just come back!"

"That's not something you generally come back from," Tony says numbly. He's thinking about Bucky, lying dead in Tony's car or an alley somewhere. He puts his hand over his eyes, takes a few deep breaths while he really, really tries to stop picturing it. "He would've killed you," Tony rips his hand away from his face. "He would've _killed_ you. Jesus Christ."

"He doesn't know," James says.

Tony hugs James again. "Jesus Christ," he breathes. "You're right. That wasn't stupid. That was really smart and incredibly brave." And Tony tried to warn Barnes off taking the housing. Some fucking genius. He feels sick.

Tony pulls back. He puts his hands on either side of James' head, looking him straight in his wide blue eyes. "You can't let him take control again, James. You have to promise me that: that you won't ever let him take control again. I know he's trying to protect you, but he could've killed you tonight. And if he pushes you behind him again you might not be able to come back in time to stop him. You understand? You understand me, right?"

James nods, his head still between Tony's hands. "I promise," he says. "I promise I won't let him come back."

"Great. That's great. Okay." Tony's exhale is hardly one of relief. He hugs James again. He's probably smothering the poor kid, but it's like the fear of what could've happened just crept up on him and he can't stand it. Maybe this is what parents feel like, after something terrible almost happens. All Tony knows is that he doesn't want to let go of him.

But James has other ideas. He squirms until Tony has to release him. "Can I put on my arm now?" he asks, all bright-eyed with excitement like he hadn't been screaming a few minutes ago.

"Sure. Might as well, huh, kiddo?" Tony has to clear his throat to smooth out his voice. "You suffered enough for it." He gets up, wiping at his eyes. "J, please let the med suite know where James is, and that he's fine, okay? I don't want Steve to freak out."

"Very well, sir." J.A.R.V.I.S still sounds chastised.

"And you can relax, J. I still love you."

"Thank you. I can feel it, sir."

Tony's pretty sure the A.I.'s being sarcastic, but he ignores him. He picks up the prosthetic arm and brings it back to James. "This won't hurt a bit," he says.

James smiles.


	5. Chapter 5

Pepper steps out of the taxi in front of Avenger's Tower, then shoulders her purse, grips the handle of her carryon, takes a deep breath and walks into the building.

It's not that she doesn't want to be home. Far from it. It's just, she's tired. Switzerland is beautiful and clean and peaceful and everyone at the New Directions in Clean Energy Conference was courteous, intelligent, and suitably respectful of her position as C.E.O. of Stark Industries. But dealing with all the courteous, intelligent and respectful scientists, business people and members of various governments was exhausting. Sometimes it feels like everyone wants her for something, and if she gives just one inch more she'll unravel like a worn sweater.

She was very happy to be able to get away a day early. But her home is also now the home of eight other people including Tony, though sometimes he feels like seven people all by himself. And much as she truly loves Tony and genuinely likes the Avengers, it's just…there's a lot of them. And the only remotely normal one is Sam.

Pepper has no problem with that. She grew up normal in a nice, normal household with nice, normal people and by the time she left for New York she was so bored she thought she'd go insane. But sometimes, like coming home from long, exhausting trips to long, exhausting conferences, she would like the surety that a disaster isn't waiting for her as soon as she sets foot in the lobby.

So, if she needs a few seconds to take a deep breath and steel herself for whatever she's unknowingly walking into, well. She's still glad to be home.

She leaves her bags and her shoes next to the private elevator, knowing they'll be brought up later, then finds out from J.A.R.V.I.S. where Tony is. He sounds oddly subdued when he says Tony's in his workshop, but what's even odder is how he adds, "I believe he is with Bucky Barnes", as if he wouldn't automatically know.

Pepper makes a mental note to ask Tony about it—and Bucky, if he's actually there. She's a little disappointed that she won't have Tony to herself, but she's not surprised that one of the Avengers is in Tony's secret lair with him, even at 4:45 in the morning. Tony loves making them things, and Bucky's arm is his new favorite. She hopes Bucky appreciates the amount of thought and effort Tony put into the newest one.

She's yawning as she steps off the elevator, wondering if she'll be able to get Tony into bed and hoping he hasn't been doing marathon all-nighters in her absence. The other Avengers look out for him but, well, none of them are particularly good at self-care. Except Sam, of course, but he won't fight with Tony about food and sleep the way she will.

So, she expects Tony to be maybe a little jittery on exhaustion and caffeine and Bucky to be sitting more-or-less patiently at the workshop table with his left arm spilling wires like a robot in a Lucas film. So she's more than a little surprised to see Tony messing with a Starktab at one end of the oversized, ratty couch he refuses to get rid of, with Bucky laying on his side along the rest of it, obviously deeply asleep with his head on Tony's thigh.

Pepper doesn't know how long she stands there just outside the closed glass doors, watching Tony watching over Bucky while he sleeps, because Tony is definitely watching over him. Every so often Bucky moves or twitches like he's on the precipice of a nightmare, and Tony cards his fingers through Bucky's hair and murmurs something to him that she can't hear, and a little while later Bucky relaxes again.

It's not even close to what she expected. But it's also sweet. More than that, it's…quiet. Peaceful, in a way Pepper wouldn't normally associate with either of them. If the couch were long enough, she'd be tempted to go stretch out on Tony's other side.

The only thing she doesn't understand is why Bucky's sleeping down here instead of with Steve.

The doors to the workshop slide open with barely a whisper of machinery, but Tony looks up anyway. He blinks when he sees her, then grins. But then he glances down at Bucky and when he looks back up she can see the incipient panic in his expression, like he's sure she's going to start screaming at him about infidelity or stealing other people's boyfriends.

She might be offended at the assumption, if she wasn't used to Tony assuming everyone thinks the worst of him because he thinks the worst of himself. But Pepper knows what kind of man he is, and she held his heart long before she gave him her own. So the only thing she does is put a finger to her lips, then bend down and softly kiss him.

The smile he gives her is so grateful it makes her sad, but a lot of things that Tony is grateful for make her sad, so she sets that aside the way she usually does in favor of action. She borrows his tablet so she can silently type out, 'Is something wrong with Bucky? Is Steve okay?' Because those are the only concerns she walked in here with.

Tony grimaces and types, 'complicated. help me w him?'

She nods and takes the tablet again to silently put it on the table. Then comes one of the many, many tasks Pepper never even thought about before she met Tony: in this case helping to hold Bucky's head so Tony can get off the couch without waking him. Considering Bucky's history she's amazed that it works, but when they've managed to substitute a cushion for Tony's thigh, Tony takes her hand and limps as quietly as possible out of the workshop.

"Ow. Ow. Ow," he complains just as quietly once the glass doors are shut. He puts his arm around her shoulder for balance while he shakes out his leg. "Kid's got a head like a cannonball. I think I have permanent nerve damage. You're back early. Unless you're back on time and I missed a day somewhere?"

"I'm back early," she confirms, leaning into him once he has both feet on the floor. "All that fresh food and clean air was exhausting. And I may have missed you a little. Nothing blew up the entire time I was there."

His smirk is a little too wan, even for five in the morning. "Too bad you left just before the explosions."

She circles his waist with her arms. "I saw the attacks on the news. It looked even worse than what you said on the phone. I'm amazed that you all came through it all right."

"Yeah, well." Tony gestures at Bucky. It should feel stranger than it does that they're both watching him sleep. Maybe more invasive, too, and Pepper thinks it probably would if she couldn't tell how concerned Tony is. "Turns out I was a little premature in that assessment."

Pepper looks at him. "What do you mean? What's wrong with him?" She gasps. " _Is_ it Steve? Is that why Bucky's not with him?"

Tony shakes his head. "Steve's fine. Well, physically fine, considering." He takes a breath. "Remember last year, when Sam and I found Bucky trashing that bank vault where Hydra'd been keeping him?"

She nods. "You called it the 'Vault of Evil'. Oh my God, did they try to capture him?"

"No, but it's almost as bad." He grimaces. "I'm not explaining this right. You remember why we took him to Asgard? I mean, of course you would, it was your idea. But, how he had, like, four different people running around in his head?"

"Of course I do. But, they fixed him." Her eyes go wide at the misery in his expression. "It's been over a year…I thought they fixed him?"

"They did fix him," Tony says. "He got broken again."

"Oh my God," Pepper looks at Bucky, as if he'd show some outward sign of the tumult inside him. "Oh my God. What happened?"

"The TL;DR version is that Steve got shot, and Bucky just…lost it." Tony sighs. "Right now there's a turf war going on between Sergeant Barnes, who's basically Bucky with combat specifications, and James, who you may remember hearing about as the resident whipping boy." He nods at Bucky. "That's actually James, sleeping in there right now. And, he's nine, Pep. He's a little kid. He's nine years old."

Pepper gapes at him. "What?"

Tony laughs the way he does when he knows nothing's funny. "Oh believe me—it gets worse."

* * *

It definitely gets worse.

If anything, Tony tends to exaggerate the trivial and downplay the important. So his attempt at a precise depiction of what happened since yesterday night, with as few of his usual tangents and backtracked explanations as possible, only underlines just how bad it is.

Tony also breaks off a few times to go back into the workshop and calm James down again. Pepper is impressed and, if she's honest, a little shocked at how well he can. 

By the time Tony's told her how James lied to Barnes to allow him to take over again to keep Barnes from accidentally committing suicide, it's nearly six in the morning and Pepper's staring through the glass doors with both her hands over her mouth.

"Yeah," Tony says at her reaction. "That's kind of how we've all dealt with it, so far."

"Thank God Steve wasn't killed," Pepper says. The news reports she saw had vague information that he'd been injured, but nothing about how close they all came to losing him.

Tony nods soberly. "No fucking kidding. I just wish Bucky hadn't found out about it."

"It sounds like what happened was inevitable," Pepper says. "Whenever Steve got badly hurt, Barnes was going to take over."

"Yeah, probably."

In the room, James is shifting like he's going to wake up soon. Pepper thinks of what Tony just told her and she looks at him worriedly. "Is that going to be Barnes, when he wakes up? You said Barnes took control when James fell asleep."

"Yeah. I'm pretty sure that's why he's been so restless, Barnes trying to elbow the kid aside," Tony says grimly. "Luckily they're both so fucking stubborn."

Nothing about this feels lucky, other than Bucky still being alive. Pepper nods anyway. "Do you think the Asgardians could heal him again?"

"I don't know." Tony cards his fingers through his hair. He looks exhausted. "Last time they got his memories all sorted out, so at least he had his own history back. But from what Barnes told me, it doesn't sound like that actually integrated any of the identities the way we thought it would. It just made all of them who weren't Bucky dormant. And it didn't even affect Barnes, since he was buried so deep or something that it was like he didn't exist. But now…" He shrugs. "Before, they were all bleeding into each other, and they didn't all have the same memories. Now, it's like they're all aware of each other—at least some of them are—but they're way more separate."

"And hostile."

"Yup. And it all hinges on the kid. Barnes told me that James can't reintegrate because he has to keep the pain. But when I asked Barnes if he and Bucky could rejoin if James and the Asset weren't there, he said they could and got all wistful about it. It's something he really wants, Pep. Only, I have no fucking clue how to extract James without giving Bucky permanent brain damage. Or what to do with James if I ever figure that part out." He points at the tablet, still laying where they left it on the work table back in the lab. "That's what I was doing when you came in, trying to design a memory/identity extracting machine." He smirks humorlessly. "I don't even know what the hell to call it."

"Maybe the Asgardians can help with that?"

"Maybe." Tony doesn't sound hopeful. "But I can't…we can't just, pull James out and let…" He huffs out an unhappy breath. "Even if Thor's peeps can do it, if they erase James, he'll disappear. He'll be gone." His mouth twitches in a smile that she recognizes as completely self-depreciative. "And believe me, I feel like a grade-A asshole for even worrying about that. Like, what kind of selfish fuck does it make me, that I'd even consider letting Bucky keep suffering just so I don't have to…" He stops, mouth pursed in anger. "He's not even a real kid."

"From everything you've said, it sounds like he's as real as Bucky," Pepper says. She takes Tony's hand. "It doesn't make you selfish to want to look after a child."

Tony looks away from her, his eyes going back to James like he can't help himself. "That's the thing, Pepper," he says quietly. "That's the problem. I _want_ to look after him. I want _him._ I want him to be my kid." He turns to her with somber, dark eyes. "Our kid. I want us to give him teddy bears and tuck him in at night and take him to the zoo and make sure he gets enough food and, and _everything._ " He shakes his head. "I don't even know what 'everything' is. I just know that I want to be a better father—a _way_ better father—than I had. And I want to be his father. And for you to be his mom." He smirks, and it's a little apologetic and entirely heartbreaking. "Stupid, huh?" He looks away again, letting go of her hand to put both of his on his hips. "Don't mind me. I haven't slept in like, nearly two days and I'm pretty much just babbling. Just think of this as, I don't know. Another mid-life crises." He barely glances at her in put-on curiosity. "You can have more than one of those, right? Actually, I'm sure I've had a couple already."

"Tony," she says, going to him and putting her hand on his arm.

He doesn't look at her. "Seriously, this is just…my biological clock exploding, or something. It'll pass. Sorry. Oh, I think he's waking up."

"Tony!" She makes her voice sharp enough that she actually gets his attention. "James is fine. And it's not stupid," she says, keeping her voice in the kind-but-don't-fuck-with-me range she's perfected after over a decade of being with him. "There's nothing stupid about this. But I won't pretend this isn't sudden, because it's incredibly sudden. I didn't think you wanted children."

He shrugs, looking at James again. "Well, it was kind of moot after being a walking nuclear reactor for seven years. And who the hell would be dumb enough to let me adopt, right?" He pastes on that awful smirk again. "I just figured it was for the best, you know? I'm no one's idea of safe, sane parenting."

"Only bad parents think they'll be good ones right out of the gate, Tony." She doesn't really think that's true, but at least it gets him listening. "And, okay…" Pepper takes a long, deep breath, thinking ironically about how much practice she's had over the years, wrangling Tony and his occasionally breathtakingly childish decisions. "I'm a little blindsided. A lot blindsided. I mean, you're right. This is the last thing I expected to be talking about with you, well, ever. Not to mention that from everything you've just told me, if I agree to this I'm most likely going to be a parent a lot sooner than I'll be ready for. _But_ ," she stresses the word before he starts talking. "That doesn't mean I'm going to say no."

Tony opens his mouth, shuts it. Opens it again. "…Really?" His voice is so small that even in the almost-complete silence surrounding them Pepper can barely hear it.

"Really," she says, nodding with far more confidence than she feels. "I mean, I'm terrified. Of course I'm terrified. No sane person wouldn't be. But, yes." She pulls herself up, looking straight into his eyes. "Yes, Tony. Really." 

Tony's face lights up, bright and happy in a way Pepper's not sure she's ever seen. He hugs her around the waist, and even though they're almost the same height he lifts her up and spins her around like something out of a movie. "Thank you," he says when he puts her down. "Thank you. Thank you. Wow. You seriously have no idea, Pep…I…wow."

"I think I have some idea," Pepper says dryly. But Tony just laughs and kisses her.

"I might not be able to do it," he says after a moment, and there's more real fear in his voice than she can remember hearing in a long time.

"You'll do it," she says before she kisses him again. She's not even surprised with how much she believes it.

It doesn't change how she really never expected anything like this, or how she came home and stepped right into the disaster she was dreading. But Pepper is nothing if not adaptable and quick on her feet. And she knows Bucky. Not as well as Tony, but she knows him and likes him. And if James is a younger version of Bucky, then she's sure she can make it work.

After all, she survived more than a decade with Iron Man.

The door to the workshop slides open, and Tony jerks his mouth away from hers and steps back. "Hi, James," he says, sounding ridiculously embarrassed. Considering the things Pepper's caught him doing and the things he's occasionally done in public, his reaction to being caught kissing by a child is endearingly hilarious. "We were just, uh…"

"Hello, James," Pepper says, stepping in front of Tony and offering her hand. "Tony was just telling me about you. I'm Pepper Potts. I'm very pleased to meet you."

"Hi, Pepper," James says. He shakes her hand, smiling shyly. His hand is warm from sleep. "Bucky knows you."

"That's right. We're friends." Pepper smiles at him, trying not to show how disconcerting it is to be apparently talking to James when he looks like Bucky, who is so clearly an adult. He's taller than she is, so she even has to tilt her head to look him in the eyes. "I'm looking forward to getting to know you, too."

"Okay," James says, like he's not sure how to answer that. He looks at Tony. "Is it morning?"

"More or less," Tony says. "You can go back to sleep if you want, though."

"Will I have to go back to the doctors?" James asks worriedly. He rubs his new left arm.

"Not anymore." Tony grins. "You're all healed and you've got your awesome new arm and everything. All we need now is to figure out how to get Sergeant Barnes and the Asset to play nice."

"What would you like to do, James?" Pepper asks him, because he's just looking at them both uncertainly. "We can take you back to your floor, or we can get you breakfast if you're hungry, or we can go to the medical suite if your shoulder is bothering you."

"Or your head," Tony adds. "Is your head still hurting?"

"No, everything's fine," James says. Maybe too quickly, but Pepper doesn't know him well enough to judge, and Tony seems to accept it. "But I'm hungry. Can I eat? Please?" he adds, looking at Pepper like he's just remembered to be polite.

"Sure, kiddo," Tony says. "I'm hungry. And you probably are, too," he says to Pepper. "Hey, J.A.R.V.I.S," he goes on before she can answer. He's already walking towards the elevator, casually snagging both her hand and James' and pulling them with him. "Are there any of Sam's pancakes left?"

"There are four, sir," the A.I. answers immediately as the three of them go to the elevator. "But given Bucky Barnes' normal preferences, I feel I should also point out that we have two boxes of Pop Tarts, in assorted flavors."

"You are _not_ having Pop Tarts for breakfast," Tony says to James. "Those aren't breakfast food. Hell, they aren't food. They're like, dessert, masquerading as food. At least pancakes have flour and eggs and actual ingredients."

Pepper blinks, remembering how once upon a time Tony's idea of 'breakfast' was champagne sucked out of a prostitute's navel at two-thirty in the morning. But what truly surprises her is how Tony's holding James' hand as well as hers and how James doesn't seem to mind it at all. Like they're already a family.

It's barely ten steps to the elevator, which of course smoothly slides open immediately thanks to J.A.R.V.I.S. "Jeez, you and Steve put out a lot of heat, you know that?" Tony says to James as they step inside. "It's a wonder your head didn't burn through my leg when you were sleeping. Your hand's like a little nuclear reactor. We could probably power the whole building with it. Here." He changes his grip so he can hold James' palm against the wall of the elevator. "I'll bet we get there twice as fast now."

"That's not true," James says, but he's grinning.

"You should use your left hand too," Pepper says, making her voice very serious. "We could get there four times as fast."

The look James gives her is entirely knowing. But he's still smiling when he puts his left hand on the wall.

* * *

"Seriously, we're talking about four slices of banana here. You can eat four slices of banana."

"I'm full."

"Come on, you just ate four pancakes and you can't manage four slices of banana? Bananas are full of potassium. You need potassium after crawling through the ventilation shafts all night. And, and look at them. They're lonely." 

James looks decidedly unimpressed. "They can't be lonely. They're bananas."

"That's what you think," Tony says. He picks up James' fork and stabs a banana slice with it. "Please, eat me, James," he says in a ridiculous squeak, jiggling the banana on the plate. "I want to be with my family. See?" he adds in his normal voice. "She's crying."

Pepper is watching both of them with her chin in her palm and her elbow resting inelegantly on the table. Her other hand is clutching her second cup of coffee. She has a vague thought of intervening, but they both seem to be enjoying themselves and she is, despite the coffee, honestly about to fall asleep in her chair. She's also fascinated to see Tony like this. He was the one who brought the pancakes from the common kitchen to their own suite, then fetched breakfast for both of them before he got his own—yoghurt and blueberries for Pepper, the pancakes and surgically-sliced banana for James—and he even remembered to offer juice or milk and make the coffee. He also gave James one of his hoodies, since Barnes was shirtless when he broke out of the med suite.

It's as if, now that Tony's decided he's going to be a dad, he's thrown himself into it with the same all-consuming intensity that he does with anything that's important to him. Like making his Iron Man suits or reassembling the Avengers, or the way he started treating her like gold when he realized she really wasn't going to leave him.

Actually, Pepper thinks, that's exactly what he's doing. And it's so typical of him, to make a life-changing decision on the spur of the moment and then follow through with everything he has. It's as awe-inspiring and admirable as it can by terrifying, but it's also one of the reasons she loves him so much: his absolute dedication to what matters to him.

And this could be their life, she thinks. Mornings like this one, drowsing over coffee and arguing about bananas. James could be their son. It's annoyingly difficult for her to imagine what James would look like as the child he should be. Pepper's too tired; the best she can do is to think of pictures she's seen of Tony in the late 70s. He was all floppy, dark-brown hair and huge, mischievous dark eyes, and skinny little pointed elbows and knees. Not too different from James, probably, except for how James' hair would be lighter brown and his eyes that same stormy blue. 

"The banana's crying 'cause she's scared," James says.

"Well, yeah—afraid of being left behind, doomed to end up in the compost while her family are happily digested…"

James picks up the fork, holds the banana near his ear. "She told me she wants to be composted."

"He did eat most of it already," Pepper adds, because at this rate the two of them are going to be here arguing until lunchtime and she'll never be able to have a nap. Tony is in desperate need of sleep as well, and she can see how tired James is in the dark streaks under his eyes.

"Traitor," Tony says to her.

James grins.

Tony gives a big, artful sigh. "Fine," he says to James. "Three slices."

"One."

"Two."

James' sigh is even more artful, but he takes the fork again, stabs another piece of banana and shoves both of them in his mouth.

"High five on your negotiating skills," Tony says. Pepper notes how he keeps his hand low and near to his own body.

James chews and swallows, then smacks his palm to Tony's.

"All right," Pepper sighs, relieved. She takes a long, grateful swallow that drains the cup, then pushes back from the table. "Now that the great banana war is over, I think it's time for a nap."

James eyes her bowl. "You still have some blueberries."

Pepper looks at Tony, who just grins at her like this is hilarious. No help there, obviously. "Well," she starts. "I'm an adult. So, I don't need to grow anymore. So, I don't have to eat all the blueberries." She ignores how James' body has technically belonged to an adult for longer than she's been alive.

James blinks, then gives her the biggest, most pathetic puppy-eyes she's ever seen. "They're crying."

Tony nods sadly. "I can hear them."

"You are both completely horrible," Pepper says, but she eats the blueberries.

Tony and James high-five again.

"All right, now that there are no longer any miserable pieces of fruit to deal with, I'm going to bed," Pepper says. She looks at them. "And you both are too. Don't even start," she says, pointing at James when he looks mutinous. "I know you were awake in the middle of the night. And I also know it wasn't your—"

"Pardon the interruption, Ms. Potts," J.A.R.V.I.S. cuts in. "But I believe I've located Grant Ward."

Tony stands, instantly completely focused. "Please assemble the Avengers, J.A.R.V.I.S."

"Already done, sir. Would you like me to contact Agent Coulson?"

"Yeah, thanks." Tony looks at her and James, and a mixture of apology, regret and worry flickers across his face. "Pep, can you…"

"Of course." Pepper nods quickly. She smiles at James. "Looks like it's going to be you and me and J.A.R.V.I.S. today, James. Tony has to go with the other Avengers, but I'm staying with you."

James stands up as well. He looks scared. "Is Grant Ward the man who tried to kill Steve?"

Tony glances at Pepper helplessly, then nods. "Yeah," he says. "We found out where Hydra's keeping him. They're hurting him the way they hurt you, to make him do bad things. We're going to rescue him, and make sure Hydra can't ever hurt anyone else."

James closes his eyes, swallowing heavily like he feels nauseous. He holds his left arm like it hurts. "Sergeant Barnes is angry," he says. His voice is soft but it makes Pepper think of the Hulk.

"James, remember your promise," Tony says, sharply enough that James' eyes snap open. "It doesn't matter how angry he is. You can't let him out. You understand that, right? He has to stay behind you."

James nods. He presses his palm to his temple like he's in pain. "He wants Ward to die. He hurt Steve."

"I know. I know he does," Tony says, gentling his voice. "And he's not the only one who's angry at Ward, believe me. But you can't let him do that. Ward might have information we need. And Steve wouldn't want Barnes to kill him."

"I know," James says. "I know. I won't let him out."

"Good boy," Tony says. He hugs James, then kisses Pepper. "I'll have J fill you in when we know how this is going down. I'll be back as soon as I can."

Pepper nods quickly. "Be safe."

"Bye, Tony," James says.

"Come on, honey," Pepper says to James. She takes his hand, gently leading him out of the room as Tony leaves. It's strange how large his palm is against her own, when he's obviously so young as this version of himself. "I don't know about you, but I could use a distraction. Would you like to watch a movie?"

James nods distantly. "Okay."

"Great," Pepper says, trying to keep her voice bright and not show how worried she is for all of them. "It's still pretty early in the morning. If I know the Avengers, they'll probably want to stage the rescue at night. So I bet we can see them after their meeting, if you want."

"Yeah," James says. He looks the way Pepper feels when she has a migraine. He doesn't protest at all about climbing onto the bed in the guestroom. "Can I see Steve?"

"I'm sure he'd like that." Pepper squeezes his hand affectionately. "J.A.R.V.I.S., could you please let Steve know that James would like to visit with him before he leaves, if possible?"

"Certainly. Agent Barton would like to know if James would like him to bring the Captain Bearmerica."

"Yes, please," Pepper says when James nods again. "I'll be right back. I just want to get into something more comfortable than my business clothes," she says to him. She points at the very large television screen on the wall. "Just tell J.A.R.V.I.S. what you'd like to watch."

"Okay."

He looks remarkably small, huddled up against the pillows. Small and miserable and afraid. Pepper puts her hand on his forehead, smoothing back his unruly hair. His head feels warm, but he's in a hoodie and she has no idea what's too warm for a super soldier. "You look like your head is hurting pretty badly. Do you want to see the doctors? I'll go with you."

He shakes his head.

"All right. Let's see then, okay?" Pepper acquiesces, because she's just seen how stubborn James is. "If you're not feeling better after the movie, we'll go to the doctor."

"Okay."

"I'll be right back," she says again. "And I'm going to bring you some medicine, too. It won't hurt you," she adds quickly in case he'd be concerned about that. "It'll just stop the headache." She sincerely doubts that even an entire bottle of Ibuprofen could harm him. Hopefully it'll actually help.

She all but runs to her and Tony's bedroom and changes into sweatpants and a tee-shirt, then grabs the Ibuprofen and swings by the kitchen for a glass of water.

When she gets back to the guestroom less than three minutes later, James is asleep.

Pepper stands there blinking at him for a moment, then puts the water and pill bottle carefully on the bedside table. She goes around to the other side of the bed and lies down beside him.

"J.A.R.V.I.S.," she says, very quiet, "please wake me if James gets restless."

"Certainly, Ms. Potts." The A.I. keeps his voice as low as hers.

Pepper whispers a thank you then closes her eyes, but she's too keyed up to sleep. She ends up by getting her Starktab, thinking she can at least catch up on some work she missed while she was at the conference.

Instead, she starts searching through the company's R & D archives. She really doesn't expect to find some miraculous, half-finished project that would somehow let them move James from Bucky's head into a body of his own; The closest thing she knows of is J.A.R.V.I.S.' control of the Iron Man suits, and when she thinks of a robot child, her mind gets stuck on the pathetic and creepy little boy from Spielberg's _Artificial Intelligence_ movie.

Pepper shudders, then swipes the tablet off and puts it on the bedside table and lies down. She closes her eyes, hoping she won't dream of unctuous robot children.

She sighs, sits up and grabs the tablet again. Most of Stark Industries' files have been digitized, even back to the technology Howard designed for the S.S.R. Thanks to Tony, Pepper has clearance to look at all of it. After the death of Erskine, Howard was the last, best hope to reproduce the serum, back in the day. And they had plenty of Steve's blood and skin samples. It's not too far a stretch to think Howard might have thought about cloning…

Pepper rolls her eyes at herself. She's obviously far too tired if she's really started thinking along those lines. A robot boy is far more realistic, and plausible. She's sure Tony would make one that wasn't creepy at all.

She knows she should put the tablet down and try to get some sleep, but somehow she keeps scrolling through the files anyway.

* * *

"Wait a sec—what the hell is the baby agent doing here?"

Skye is startled enough by Tony Stark's outburst that she actually stops dead on the quinjet's ramp and looks behind her, expecting to see an actual baby. Maybe wearing a little S.H.I.E.L.D. uniform and slurping a pacifier with an eagle on it.

"She's a level two field agent," Coulson says, striding up the ramp next to her. A.C. says it like that's the only thing Stark needs to know, and Skye can't help thinking, _suck it, Iron Man_ then hoping all the smug doesn't show up on her face.

"What, she's in second grade and suddenly that means she can toddle into a Hydra base?" Tony's clomping around the back of the jet in his Iron Man suit with the faceplate up. His hair and eyes remind Skye freakily of Ward, though she doesn't think she ever saw Ward this angry. She has no idea where this hate-on is coming from, but it's got that, 'put-the-gun-down-and-back-away-slowly' vibe all over it. She's a little worried. 

"Are you that hard up for agents that you're trolling daycares, now?" Tony keeps on ranting. "Or do you just want to get rid of her?"

"Hey!" Skye says, offended. "I'm twenty-two. And I've been taking care of myself for a long time." 

"Yeah, well, I don't think slumming it in a van and spamming government websites with hippie slogans is an appropriate prerequisite for conducting raids on armed fascists with walking W.M.D.s! Of course I looked her up," Tony snaps at A.C. before he can do more than frown.

"Tony, you going to sit down back there? Or am I going to have to deplane you?" Clint calls from the cockpit. Natasha's flying this quinjet with him. Trip and May are in the second jet, which is also carrying Steve and Sam. One flyer each, since Thor's not back from Asgard yet. That's too bad, because he's really cute and could probably take down the whole Hydra base by himself.

Not to mention slam Tony into next week. And he would, too. He's chivalrous like that.

"Are you all right here, Skye? There's room in the other quinjet," Coulson says to her. He eyes Tony warily, like any second he's going to pop along with the snap and crackle.

"She's not all right here. She shouldn't be here!" Tony smacks the bulkhead of the jet with his palm. It makes a really loud clang but nothing seems to break. "I am _sick_ of little kids getting hurt."

"Okay, you are really tipping my weird-o meter," Skye says to him. She spreads her arms. "Twenty-two, here. Old enough to drive, vote and drink. In that order. I know I'm, like, literally half your age, but—"

"What the hell is going on here?"

"Now you're in trouble," Skye says to Tony, because Captain-freaking-America has just stomped into the quinjet with his shield on his back and the chinstrap of his helmet dangling loose like he's about to yank his helmet off and beat Tony with it.

"Stark is having issues with Skye taking part in the rescue mission," A.C. says.

Steve looks at her, then at Tony. "Why?"

Tony gestures at her like it's obvious. "She's a baby."

"I'm twenty-two! Seriously, what's your problem?"

"I was barely older than her when I was leading the Howling Commandos during the war," Steve says.

Tony snorts. "Yeah. Full of super soldier serum with a vibranium shield and a helmet." He gestures at Skye again. "She's got a Kevlar vest and a scrunchie. Then again, that's about what your Commandos got, so I guess you wouldn't have a problem with that. Though maybe James did, around the time he fell out of a train—"

" _Don't,_ " Steve says. His voice isn't even loud, but there is so much pain and rage cutting through it that Tony stops dead with his mouth open. Skye does too and he's not even talking to her. "I really don't know what's eating you, Tony," he goes on with biting calm, "but you're clearly exhausted and not thinking straight. I think it'd be better if you sat this one out."

Skye barely knows Tony, but even she knows that was the totally wrong thing to say, and that's before Tony looks at Steve like Steve just stomped on a puppy while declaring his allegiance to Hydra. "If you think I'm going to sit on my metal ass while Hydra tortures another kid and fucking _violates his brain_ like they did to Bucky—!"

"Then stop holding up our mission," Steve grinds every word through his teeth. "Either you sit down and shut up, or you get out of this quinjet right now."

Skye glances out the back of the quinjet. They're on the roof of Avengers Tower. It's night and a little chilly this high up, but it's not like Steve's threatening to leave Stark out on an ice floe. But Tony just grits his teeth hard enough to crack the enamel and sits down.

Steve looks at him for a moment, then nods. He does up his chinstrap like that's ending the conversation. "Get some sleep, Tony. Wheels up in two," he adds to the cockpit, then stomps out of the plane.

Coulson sits down as well, efficiently strapping himself in as he watches Cap leave. There's a tiny crease between his eyebrows. "I thought Bucky didn't like to use 'James'," he says to Tony.

"He doesn't," Tony says flatly.

"Is something wrong with Bucky?" Skye asks, looking between the two men. "Was he injured worse than you guys thought, or something?"

"Yes," Tony says.

"No," A.C. says at the same time.

"Okay," Skye says slowly. "But, he's going to be okay, isn't he?"

"Of course he will," A.C. says, with that smile that looks kind of fake and real at the same time.

Tony doesn't say anything.

"I guess that explains why Captain America looked so pissed," Skye says, thinking out loud. 'Anguished' is probably a better word, but 'pissed' seems nicer. "Well, other than Irony Man being all ranty about children."

"I see what you did there," Tony says. He sighs, like he's just letting his anger go all at once. "I can't believe we're going to Maine. Maine, D.C., Jersey… It's like, Hydra has a thing for States no one actually wants to live in."

"I happen to like D.C.," Coulson says mildly.

"That's the point, Tony," Natasha says from the cockpit, sounding bored. "The less appealing the place, the fewer people to worry about."

"Except us," Skye says eagerly, then realizes she probably sounded just like the little kid Tony accused her of being. She clears her throat. "I mean, hopefully they won't be expecting anyone, either."

The back hatch shuts with a metallic thunk and then they're following May's quinjet into the air. Skye has a tiny moment of kind of wishing she could be back in the tower with Jemma, or back in the Playground with her whole team. Or better yet, back before this whole awful Hydra thing, when Leo was fine and Mike hadn't gotten blown up and Ward was…

She doesn't know who Ward really was, or if he's even that person anymore.

It's too confusing and painful to think about, so instead she pulls out her laptop and checks the code of the Trojan she has ready to break into the computer system at the Hydra base. She's supposed to stay with the quinjet, using her skills to get a map of the base and whatever other info she can so the Avengers and her team won't be going in blind. She actually would've told Tony that, if he hadn't been too busy raving about her being a toddler.

Still totally weird.

She pauses the code scrolling up the screen, and opens the tracking program she'd originally made to find Mike. The orange dot is still there, right in the vicinity of a supposedly abandoned barn in the middle of buttfuck nowhere, Maine. So Ward's still alive. If he's still alive, they can save him.

Save him for what, though? Skye almost says that out loud, but manages to catch it behind her teeth. Save him to toss back into that lifer prison he never got to, probably. He deserves it.

"Are you going to send Ward back to prison, once he has his memory back?" she asks Coulson.

He looks surprised at the question, then his expression kind of shuts down. "Giving him his memory back isn't necessarily on the table. Not if we can get what we need without it."

Skye can practically feel her eyes bugging. "So…what are we going to do with him, then?"

"We're going to get him out of Hydra's clutches," Coulson says, and that's totally her A.C., the badass Agent who doesn't leave anyone behind. "After that…" His mouth twitches in an expression she can't really get. "Considering who he was even before what Hydra's apparently done to him, I don't know if it will be possible to rehabilitate him."

"Why not?" Tony demands. "Bucky had his head fucked with for 70 years and we were able to rehabilitate him just fine."

Coulson just looks at him blandly.

Tony looks away.

"That's what I mean," Coulson says, as if they'd just had a conversation. "We may have to look at other alternatives."

Skye's still rolling the words, 'other alternatives' around her skull and trying to make them sound less sinister when Tony says, "you mean, put him down like a sack full of unwanted kittens."

"No way! He wouldn't do that." Skye looks at A.C. when he doesn't immediately agree with her. "You wouldn't do that."

"We may not have a choice," he says, though he looks like he hates every word. "He may not be the kind you save."

"I thought that's what S.H.I.E.L.D. did," Tony says. "Save people. Even from themselves. I thought everyone was worth saving."

"Everyone is," Natasha says. Skye didn't hear her move, but she's out of her seat, holding onto the arch just in front of the cockpit. "But not everyone can be. Sometimes all you can do is stop them."

"That's bullshit," Tony says, like Natasha just personally insulted him. "You were saved. So was Clint. So was _I_. So was Bucky. We'll save Ward too."

"Ward's evil," Skye says. 

"No he's not," Tony says. "I looked him up when I looked up your baby Agent," he says to A.C. "He made a lot of awe-inspiringly fucked-up decisions for sure. But he did it for a good reason. Or, well, an understandable one."

"I think you have a different definition of 'understandable' than most people," Skye says.

"I'm sure we read the same sealed files," Coulson says with that flat, 'I will make you suffer' smile of his. "So I'm curious as to what you think what his understandable reasoning is."

Tony shrugs surprisingly fluidly in his bulky metal suit. "Love," he says, like it's the only possible answer. "He wanted Garrett to love him like a parent would, so Ward made himself into whatever Garrett wanted, so he'd be loved."

Skye stares at him, then slumps back in her chair and looks up at the ceiling of the plane. " _We_ loved him," she almost wails it.

"Yeah." Tony nods. "And I'm sure you were nice to him, gave him a home, treated him like he wasn't actually dirt. And the whole time he was trying to figure out what the hell you wanted from him, because acting like he was a real-live, worthy human being would've made no fucking sense."

"How do you know?" Skye says. "Maybe he's just an asshole."

Tony smirks, but not like she said anything funny. "Oh, he's totally an asshole, believe me. But the reason I know about Ward is the same reason I had to be tortured in a cave for a few months before I stopped making weapons."

"What do you mean?" Skye glances at A.C., wondering if Tony's logic train is sliding off the rails and about to catch on fire and tumble into a ravine. "What does your company have to do with Ward betraying me? And S.H.I.E.L.D. Um, with Ward betraying all of us."

"Stark Industries used to make weapons," Tony says like she somehow didn't know that. "I killed so many people by proxy that I probably make the Red Skull and Arnim Zola look like _Pinky and the Brain_."

"Who?"

"A 90s children's cartoon about ineffectually villainous mice," A.C. explains.

"I got that reference," Clint exclaims happily from the cockpit.

Tony rolls his eyes. "You always get my references, Clint. You're like my holla back girl of medieval weaponry." He ignores Clint's, 'got that too!'. "The point is, Jensen," he says to Skye, "that I knew making weapons was wrong. Sure, I told myself that I was just doing my part to protect our heroic troops overseas. But I knew just as well as your Red Tide buddies did that I wasn't in the business of 'protection' so much as efficient mass murder. I could've stopped anytime." Tony's smile is like a knife he wants to stab himself with. "Sounds like an addiction, doesn't it? I know about those, too. And I could've stopped making things that killed people anytime, but I didn't. Because the late, great Howard Stark founded Stark Industries to make weapons. And even though he'd been dead for 17 years by the time I was captured, I still didn't want to disappoint him." He smirks again in that way that's really not. "Because God knows I'd been disappointing him my whole life, so maybe his being gone meant I could finally make it up to him."

"I'm sorry," Skye says.

Tony shrugs. "Yeah, well. I finally figured out the old man was dead around the same time I realized that I didn't actually want to be." He leans back and crosses his arms, then closes his eyes. "Basically, some kids will make an astounding number of awe-inspiringly fucked-up decisions, trying to get someone to love them. And on a wanton destruction scale of, say, Dr. Doom to Loki, Ward has a hell of a lot less red in his ledger than I do."

"That doesn't change what he did," Coulson says.

Tony shakes his head and reopens his eyes. "Of course it doesn't. Like I said, he's an asshole. And if he'd made it to your maximum-security prison for wayward psychotic agents, bam. End of story. No problem. But he didn't. He got stolen the way Bucky did. And if Hydra did anything to Ward like what they did to Barnes, then he's paid his dues. With interest. It would've been kinder to shoot him."

"It might still be kinder to shoot him," Natasha says.

Skye looks at Coulson. "Or never let him get his memory back."

"It might be moot anyway," Coulson says.

* * *

"Is Tony all right?" Sam asks as soon as Steve gets back into their quinjet.

Steve shrugs. He sits down across from Sam, tugging on his belt. "He hasn't slept in going on three days now. He was ranting at Agent Skye about her being too young for the mission. He calmed down quickly enough, but I honestly would've rather benched him. If there was any hope of him actually staying behind."

"Not even to look after Bucky?" Sam says. Bruce already volunteered to stay behind to help Pepper with that, for several reasons. The fact that the Hulk could protect her from the Asset was only one of the more important ones. But Tony could as well, and James knows him better than Bruce.

Steve shakes his head. "If I thought that would've worked, I would've tried it, believe me. But Tony's got it in his head that Grant Ward's in the same situation Bucky was before…" He pauses, thinking. "Before you found him in the Smithsonian, I guess. Tony's made it into some kind of personal crusade to get him out of there."

"Tony's surprisingly good at picking up crusades," Sam says, pleased when that gets him a small but real smile from Steve. But it's gone almost instantly. "How are you?"

Steve looks away, checking the straps of his shield though Sam's sure he hasn't had to do that since he first slid it on his arm. "How do you think I am?" he counters quietly. "My best guy's in Pepper's and Tony's guestroom instead of our bed, being watched over while he sleeps to make sure…" He glances at the cockpit, but if May and Triplett are listening they're doing a great job of not looking like they are. "To make sure nothing happens. And unless Thor comes back with good news or Tony comes up with some miracle, it's entirely possible that this will be our life, from now on. Making sure nothing happens." He closes his eyes, rubs one with his fingertips like he's in pain. "Not so good, Sam," he says.

"I'm sorry," Sam says, wishing he had something else to offer other than his sympathy. He also wishes Tony hadn't told them about Barnes' latest attempt on the Asset, though he can't fault him for doing it. "I wish I knew a way to fix this."

"Me too."

"I still think you should be the one staying behind," Sam says. "I know you won't," he adds, because it's not like they didn't hash this out already. "But, you're going to be walking into a Hydra faction where all of them are gunning for you. And if Ward's there, it'll be his first priority to put you down after he tried and failed."

"Yeah, he failed," Steve says, like that somehow means he'll fail again. Steve adjusts his chinstrap, then scowls, undoes it and pulls his helmet off. He puts it beside him, then scrubs his fingers through his hair. "And this is far from the first time I've walked into a Hydra base where they were all gunning for me. That was basically S.O.P. during the war." He smiles, but it's just a flash of white, angry teeth. "And there's no way I'm letting my team go into a situation where I wouldn't."

"I know," Sam says. "Believe me, I know exactly where you're coming from." He smiles back, hopes it looks more genuine. "But I don't think you can blame me for trying."

"No I can't." Steve's smile is a tiny bit more genuine too. "It's too late now anyway." Because the quinjet is lifting off the tower's roof.

"Sure." Sam takes a breath, figuring he might as well deal with this while they're still on route and Steve's not happy anyway. "I don't like the idea of just circling the building while the rest of you go inside to kick ass."

"Duly noted," Steve says tiredly. "I need someone out there who can round up any operatives who manage to escape, or warn us if reinforcements arrive. And you're going to be responsible for protecting Agent Skye."

"Clint could do that from the roof."

"He wouldn't be able to get to her as fast as you can. And you know as well as I do that inside the building, your wings are just going to be a liability."

"Fine," Sam says, trying not to sound petulant. He runs his palm over his hair. "I don't like not having your back."

Steve grins, and this one is warm and entirely real. "I know, Sam. And I appreciate it. But this way you'll have all our backs. And if I put you in danger Natasha will pound me into the ground like a tent peg."

"That she will." Sam chuckles. He's been in danger plenty of times since joining the Avengers, just like he put himself in danger helping Steve take down the helicarriers. But he will readily concede that he works better in the air, kind of like Clint. "All right," he says, giving in. "I'll be your flyboy."

"I was thinking more bird of prey," Steve says, grinning.

"That works too," Sam says, grinning back at him.

* * *

"All right, Brave Monkey is in!" Skye crows.

Completely justifiably, as far as Tony's concerned. She's still too inexperienced to be there (not too young; he can admit that. He might've been…exaggerating a little), but the girl's got skills.

"Cloak is up," Natasha says calmly as she and the second quinjet settle softly to the ground just beyond the range of the Hydra sensors Brave Monkey is currently fucking with. If Skye's Trojan works right, the Hulk could waltz right up to the barn's front door and they won't see it.

The back hatch opens and Tony's out first, faceplate down and repulsors ready to punch him into the air.

He is _so_ looking forward to this.

Tony, for all that he's a billionaire, genius, playboy, philanthropist, doesn't have many friends. In fact, before the Avengers he could count them on three fingers. Now he needs to add his toes, and he loves that. He loves having all these people who mostly get him and still seem to like having him around almost all of the time. Steve would say he's blessed. Pepper would say he's earned it. Tony just thinks he's damn lucky.

But, having friends is kind of like being able to blow up tanks or airplanes or entire terrorist cells with the suit—it's that whole, 'with great power comes great responsibility' thing. Tony's never been good at being responsible. But for these people he tries. They make him want to try.

The thing is, though, he also feels responsible for _them_. Like, if Bruce is sad he wants to make him happy. If Natasha slams her way through the tower scowling, he wants to help even more than he wants to get out of her way. Same for any of the people he cares about. If they're hurt, he wants to fix it.

But decades ago, Bucky got hurt worse than anyone Tony's ever met, and Tony couldn't do a single damn thing about that because he wasn't even born when it started. He couldn't even make sure the sick fucks never got to hurt anyone again, because Natasha took care of the Red Room already, and Steve took care of Hydra. All Tony could do was carry Bucky out of the Vault of Evil and give him a cool place to live and make him better left arms.

And now Bucky (James) is hurting again, and Tony can't do a damn thing to fix that, either. Not that he's going to stop trying. But now there's Grant Ward, too.

Tony doesn't know Ward; he's pretty sure he wouldn't like him if he did. Tony still meant everything he said to Skye and Coulson, though. The stupid shit deserves another chance.

But rescuing Ward also means Tony can bring at least one faction of Hydra the pain it so richly deserves. Get a little of Bucky's own back for him, even if it's 70 years too late.

Oh yeah, he's looking forward to this. It's only because he's trying to be responsible these days that he's not already blowing that rickety abandoned barn façade to splinters. He's waiting on Cap's word. And Cap is waiting on Skye.

"What have you got, Skye?" Coulson asks her. He's still in the jet, slapping the Velcro flaps of his Kevlar vest closed. He's wearing a dress shirt and tie underneath, along with his natty dress slacks. Tony just hopes his equally natty dress shoes have decent treads.

"I've got a map," Skye says. Her eyes are fixed on her laptop screen, fingers still leaping over the keys. "I've just sent it to J.A.R.V.I.S. for you."

"Thanks," Tony says. "J, can you project it for the others, please? Gather 'round, kids. Time for study hall."

"I hate homework," Clint murmurs, but Tony steps back so he and the others can look at the 3D projection J.A.R.V.I.S. makes of the complex inside the quinjet. The complex is surprisingly large, especially for the relatively few red dots of people wandering around in it. It spreads out in deep passageways underground from the barn like the hidden tunnels beneath an ant hill. Tony has his map all nice and neat on the display inside his helmet, and Steve barely has to glance at the thing to memorize it. And they'll have Skye directing them from the jet too.

He makes careful note of where the orange dot is that represents Ward. Ward is down at the very end of one of the tunnels on the east side of the complex. The area they're keeping him in isn't very large. The dot isn't moving. 

"Will they know we're coming?" Sam asks.

"Give me a sec," Skye says, fingers flying. "And no…they…won't." She stabs the 'enter' key triumphantly and grins at them. "They have a watch at the door. The passphrase is, 'a swamp near Lerna in the land of Argos'. That might buy you a few seconds."

"Can you disable their cameras and alarms?" Steve asks.

"Already done. I just need to give Brave Monkey the command."

"Good work." Steve nods and smiles at her, though both look tight enough to snap. He pulls on his helmet. "Wait for my signal." He turns to the rest of them. "Is everyone clear on what you're doing?"

Tony nods, waits for the others to nod. He's practically vibrating with tension. It's nearly midnight; the closer to dawn it gets likely the more people they'll have to deal with. "You and Widow go for the data. Agent, Legolas and I go after Asset 2.0. May and Trip cover all our backs and/or go for wanton destruction."—May smirks—"And Birdman circles overhead like a vulture picking off strays. We kill anyone who doesn't surrender."

Clint blinks at him. "I'm not sure if I should be impressed or worried."

"Don't forget to give them a chance to surrender," Steve says, looking at each of them. "All right. Skye, let us know when the operatives are away from the main hub, then make sure they won't see us coming."

"Don't worry, Cap," Skye says with vicious glee, "they're not going to see a thing."


	6. Chapter 6

Natasha delivers the passphrase at the door, then uses her Widow's Bite on both guards when they let her in. They're dressed like backwoods hicks, which suits the crappy rickety barn interior. But thanks to Skye they know which piece of the derelict, rusting tractor hulk to pull to reveal the trapdoor. There's no elevator, and the stairs are narrow in that 'conga line of death' way that may or may not have been done deliberately. But they all make it to the main hub without alerting anyone. Tony and his posse go east, Tony taking point.

The tunnel he's flying through is less artfully rickety than the barn, but far more genuinely decrepit. The generic whitewash on the walls is cracked, pocked in some places by neglect, erosion or bullets, showing crumbly dark brown rock beneath. The concrete floor is damp, veined with cracks and slippery in places with mold.

Most of the rusting metal doors have nothing behind them, according to Skye's information. Tony burns through the lock of one because J.A.R.V.I.S. tells him there's something large and metal there. But it's a huge, rusted parallel-processing computer that he can tell was built in the late 1960s and doesn't look like it's been turned on in decades. Tony checks it out anyway, in case there's another Arnim Zola in there, but it's just very old and very broken.

"I have to admit I'm a little disappointed," Coulson says.

"This whole place looks like a 1950s bomb shelter," Clint says. He eyes an enormous swiveling camera on the wall. "Is that you, Skye?" he says when it turns creepily to follow them.

"Smile," she says.

"It probably was a bomb shelter," Tony says. He passes another chunk of crumbling concrete that fell from the ceiling. Most of the light is coming from his chest; so many of the florescent lights are broken behind their square mesh cages that it's like they're in a horror film. "Looks like they didn't have much time to spruce the place up."

"T-junction up ahead," Skye says in his ear. "Two dots coming on your right."

Clint and Coulson flatten themselves on either side of the wall. Tony lands several paces away, because his armor is kind of eye-catching. The two operatives are wearing scrubs and talking in hushed tones. They have the fucking Hydra symbol on the I.D. cards hanging around their necks. Tony has no idea if they're that confident or that stupid.

One of them, the pretty woman with brown hair and blue eyes, has the name Meier on her card and rust-colored bloodstains on her light blue scrubs. The other one is a nervous and unremarkable man who squeaks when Coulson steps behind him and puts his gun to the back of his head.

Clint does the same thing to Meier. He prefers his bow, he's just as good with any kind of ballistic weapon. Tony knows he won't miss.

Tony slides back into view, repulsors raised and whirring menacingly. The two Hydra medical-types look appropriated menaced.

"Hi there," Coulson says. Tony's not sure if the medicos can hear the smile in his voice; it's subtle. "We're looking for Grant Ward. I have a feeling you can help us find him."

The woman licks her lips, but to her credit she doesn't sound the least bit breathless despite the gun to her head. "I have no idea who you're talking about."

"Really?" Tony says. "Seriously, that's what you're going with? You don't know who we're talking about. Well, how about this, then: we're looking for the assassin with two metal arms marked with Hydra insignias who tried to kill Captain America a couple days ago. Says his name is Ward. Ring any bells?"

The man is definitely breathless. He's also sweating from fear and swallowing so hard Tony's wondering if he's going to choke on his tongue. "I-I can show you where he is, if you promise not to kill me."

"Coward," Meier snarls at him. 

"I don't know, this place isn't that complicated. Should we promise not to kill him?" Clint says.

In one fluid move, Coulson lifts the lanyard and the I.D. over the guy's head. "I think we're good here, thanks." He shoots him in his head and the man drops like a bag of dirt.

Tony's gaping behind his face mask when Coulson calmly aims the gun at Meier. "Now, maybe you have some information that we _do_ need," Coulson says casually. "Like, lock codes, or how many other operatives are waiting for us at the end of that corridor."

If looks could kill Coulson would be greasy ash on the wall, but this time Meier's voice does have a slight tremble in it. "The procedure room is at the end of that corridor. You'll find Ward there. There is no lock code."

"Why was he bleeding?" Coulson says.

Meier glances at her scrubs as if she hadn't noticed the blood until he mentioned it. Her smile is sharp and cruel. "His mouth guard slipped when we wiped him. He bit his tongue."

"In _half?_ " Tony demands, because holy shit that's a lot of blood.

"How many guards are with him?" Coulson asks, ignoring Tony.

Meier shrugs. "I didn't think to count."

"Thank you," Coulson says blandly and shoots her too.

"What the fuck?" Tony flips his facemask up to gape openly at him. "Jesus Christ, Coulson! What about letting them surrender?"

"This is a night-night gun," Coulson says, re-holstering it. "They're both unconscious. Help me tie them," he says to Clint.

"Oh," Tony says, watching as Clint and Coulson deftly zip-tie the ankles and wrists of Meier and the scaredy-cat. "Will the gun work on Ward?"

"Hopefully," Coulson says.

"We've got short-range EMP emitters too," Clint says.

Tony knows that, of course. He just hadn't wanted to use them. He's been trapped in his suit before, unable to move. He'd really rather be unconscious.

He nods at Clint before closing his helmet up again. "Let's try the sleepy-time bullets first, okay?"

Coulson's about to answer something when all of a sudden the wail of an alarm system starts up. It sounds like a wartime air-raid siren.

May's voice sounds tense and clipped in his ear. "One got to his radio before we could take him down. You may have company."

"I could use some help keeping Hydra off our backs," Steve says over their comm. Tony can hear bullets and much more ominous laser fire in the background.

"On our way," May responds.

"We'd better wrap this up quick, gang," Tony says. He pulls up a HUD of the map inside his helmet, listening with half an ear to Skye describing what he can see to everyone else. There are four operatives coming their way, probably to secure Ward. A red dot has joined the orange one via an intersecting tunnel further ahead.

"Four Hydra dudes coming your way, and someone's with Ward," Skye says before Tony can.

"I got 'em," Clint says. He barely gives Coulson time to nod unhappily before he turns around and races back the way they came.

"You should go with him," Tony says. "I can take T-2000 on my own."

"I have the night-night gun," Coulson says.

* * *

He wakes up on a narrow cot inside a cage, eyes snapping open to the sound of an alarm. He doesn't know where he is.

He quells the flare of panic because his standing order in case of infiltration is to protect Agent Taylor, and he doesn't need to know where he is to do that. And if he's here she must be too, because she wouldn't leave him. So he gets up and goes to the door of his cage, waiting to be let out.

Now he can see the chair and the cylinder through the bars, so he assumes this is another Hydra facility. Normally when he wakes up he doesn't remember very much, but he recognizes the space around him. Maybe he hasn't been here that long.

He's in new armor and feels clean, but he knows he's been in the chair because he feels weak and a little shaky and his head still hurts, especially the back of his neck right underneath his skull. He's also cold and his arms and legs are kind of sluggish, so maybe he's been in the cylinder too. He wishes someone were there to tell him what happened.

The lock is old and he knows he could break it. Taylor isn't there and maybe she needs help, but if she doesn't and he gets out of the cage on his own she'll punish him. She might punish him even if she does need help, if he breaks the lock. So he waits.

Despite the alarms, he still feels relieved when Taylor comes in.

"There are enemies in the base," she says as unlocks the door. He goes through and stands in front of it. "They'll be here very soon. What are your orders?"

"To protect you," he says immediately. He feels good when she smiles.

"Such a good boy," she says. She puts her hand on the back of his neck and he bends obediently so she can speak directly into his ear. "Failsafe, authorization Agent Camille Taylor. _Some of us think holding on makes us strong; but sometimes it is letting go._ "

There's a sudden stabbing pain in the back of his neck, but it's gone even before he claps his hand over it. He wants to ask what just happened, but then Agent Taylor kisses him on his cheek and he's so surprised he just blinks and doesn't say anything. She cups the side of his face for a moment, and her smile's so sad he wonders if he's done something wrong.

"Don't let them capture you," she says. Then pulls her gun and whirls in time to fire at Iron Man as he kicks open the door.

* * *

Tony grits his teeth and doesn't fly on ahead, instead keeping up with Coulson as they run down the corridor. No point in being quiet now. Coulson's pretty fast, actually, even in the dress shoes.

The corridor ends at the exact kind of thick, rusty iron door you'd expect to lead to a subterranean torture chamber and/or laboratory. Tony really likes how one kick smashes it inwards. He goes in first, just in time to get several bullets in the face. If his mask wasn't down that probably would've really hurt.

The room widens to about sixty feet across, which is great because it means no conga line of death. Unfortunately the space is crowded with a white cylinder with tubes sticking out of it, some kind of really sinister-looking black chair thing, a horror-movie's idea of an operating table and a fucking _cage_ running the length of the wall on the far right, with nothing more humanizing than a military-style cot inside it.

Tony assumes that the extremely hot woman in the Hydra combat gear who shot him is the same one getting her Ramsey Snow on with Ward, considering the instant she fails to ventilate his face Bucky's heavier metal counterpart comes at him.

Coulson calmly steps inside the doorway and fires his night-night gun, but Ward blocks both bullets with his arm without even slowing down. Tony blasts him with one of his repulsors because he wants to take him out, not kill him. But whatever armor Ward's wearing must absorb the brunt of it, because Ward's first punch almost takes Tony's head off and the second one leaves a _dent_ in the middle of Tony's _face_ (looks like Hydra improved their arm design since Bucky's day; Tony's is still better) and yeah, that hurts and okay Tony maybe should've used both repulsors.

So he does, and only winces a little bit when Ward goes flying across the room into the bars of his cage. Coulson and Ramsey are exchanging gunfire. Tony can tell where the woman dodged because the night-night gun apparently leaves blue splotches all over the place. But Coulson has to dodge Ward (oops), and Tony doesn't even think before he blasts the woman so she can't shoot Coulson in the head. With both repulsors.

Ward drops away from the mangled bars, rolls back to his feet immediately. An instant later the woman hits the back wall and drops like a brick. Her chest is still smoking. She doesn't get up.

Ward sees her fall.

He screams, a wordless howl of denial and horror and fear. He crashes to his knees beside her with a clang like a sledge hammer on an anvil, then reaches out and so, so gently touches his fingers to the pulse point at her throat. It's obvious by the tragic little noise he makes that he can't feel her heart beating. But the look he levels at Tony is so black with rage it's like a pit of hell.

"Don't," Tony says, hands raised to fire again. Ward's still on his knees, but Tony knows how fast the kid can move.

"Grant Ward, stand down," Coulson orders him. His voice is as calm as Tony's ever heard it, but Ward snaps his gaze to him like the words hit a switch in his brain.

"I-I know you." Ward says, voice shaking. Then, louder, more steady, " _I know you._ Why?"

"Put your hands on your head," Coulson says. 

Ward's hands stay in shaking fists at his sides. " _Tell me why I know you._ "

"He was your handler," Tony says quickly. "Before Hydra took you. You were on his team. His name is Phil Coulson."

"We were friends," Coulson says. Tony doesn't miss the 'were', just like he doesn't miss the mild glare Coulson pitches at him for the 'handler' thing. "I wasn't your handler. I led our team. You were part of my team, Grant."

Ward stares at him in incomprehension. "I don't remember."

"The two girls—women. The two women who found you. They were part of your team, too. That's how come they knew your name," Tony says. "You were all on Phil's team."

"I don't know what you're talking about," Ward says.

Tony winces, remembering how Meier said Ward was wiped. That sure as hell isn't going to make things easier.

"We're trying to take you home, Grant," Phil says gently. "We want to help."

"Home," Ward says, like he's trying to remember what that means. He looks at the operative's body, moves his hand like he wants to stroke her hair but just makes a fist and drops it again. "Home hurts."

"No one's going to hurt you," Tony says.

Phil's mouth twitches uncomfortably but he says nothing.

Ward looks at Tony again, eyes like black flame. "You hurt me. You hurt _her._ " In one brutally fluid motion he's up at charging at Tony.

Phil shoots Ward twice in the head before Tony has to blast him again. Ward staggers, then collapses like something broken.

"That was lucky," Phil says, "I'm out of bullets." He holsters his gun, then fishes in his tac vest pockets while he crosses the space to Ward. "I'm going to need you to carry him," he says over his shoulder to Tony before he slaps a little EMP bug on each of Ward's arms.

Tony grimaces at the bugs but doesn't say anything. He goes to Ward and crouches to straighten his limbs before lifting him. When his hand closes around Ward's ankle, there's nothing yielding under his fingers, like Ward's in a metal suit too. He heard the clang when Ward knelt, but he didn't think about it. "Wait. That's weird."

"What?" Coulson's up with his real-bullet gun up and raised as he covers both doors.

"His leg. It feels weird." Tony carefully lasers a long tear into Ward's black BDU pants then spreads the cloth to look at his shin. "Holy shit. His legs are metal too."

"Seriously?"

"Like a heart attack." Tony holds out his hand. "We're going to need more EMPs."

"Is his torso bionic too?"

Tony gently palpates Ward's stomach, feeling the flesh conform to his touch. "I don't think so, but I'm not stripping him to make sure."

"Fair enough," Coulson says. He tosses Tony two more EMP bugs. "Hawkeye, what's your status?"

"I'm good to go," Clint says, sounding cheerfully intact.

"All red dots are unmoving and accounted for," Skye adds via their radios.

"Awesome," Tony says, as relieved as Coulson looks. He stands up. "Hang on a sec. Just going to do some redecorating."

He will never forget how he and Sam found Bucky: screaming in anguish and fury, so consumed with destroying the instruments of his subjugation that he hadn't noticed or cared that he was slicing himself to ribbons as he did it. No way in hell is Tony letting Hydra keep that shit around to use on anyone else.

Tony charges his repulsors and blasts the chair thing and the cylinder into itty-bitty pieces.

He lifts Ward into his arms, hoping the kid'll stay out until they can get him somewhere secure enough to take the EMP bugs off. He's heavier than Bucky was, what with all the extra hardware. The weight is nothing that the armor can't handle, but wow. Tony did _not_ expect the sheer amount of cold rage that floods through him, thinking about how Hydra _hacked off Ward's arms and legs_ the way you'd swap out parts of a machine. What's kind of worse is that Tony doesn't understand why they hadn't done that to Bucky too. He knows he would have, if he were the kind of fucking evil son of a bitch who was capable of purposely destroying other human beings in the first place.

Tony purposely pushes the anger aside. He can't change what happened to Ward or Bucky. Getting pissed over their treatment isn't going to do anything except grow him an ulcer. Instead he just adjusts his grip (Ward's more awkward to carry than Bucky, since he's as tall as Steve) and tries to find it funny that 'lifting unconscious Winter Soldiers' is now part of his job description. "Hey, assorted badasses, we've got Ward," he says over the comm. "Cap, we are leaving!"

Clint smirks in his ear. "I got that reference."

* * *

On the quinjet May gives Ward enough sedative to drop the entire cast of _Dumbo_ , but even then they switch it up so that Ward's on the same jet as Cap, Tony, Natasha and Coulson. The first three are there because they can take Ward down if necessary. Coulson's there because Ward seemed vaguely willing to listen to him.

Ward stays out, though. He's limp as a metal puppet in Tony's arms when he picks him up to take him to the medical suite. He checked Ward's mouth on the plane and it seemed like the kid had all of his tongue, but his face is gaunt and he looks about as sickly as Tony figures a super soldier can get. It reminds him of Bucky when Tony and Sam found him in D.C.

The kid needs an MRI and a sandwich, and sleep and no one hurting him.

It's four in the morning when they get into the extra-large service elevator that goes all the way to the roof, and Tony needs sleep too; he's running on fumes. But he's not going to faceplant until Ward's safely tucked away in the Hulk room. Steve stays with Tony, but it doesn't feel right to just shove Ward at Captain America so Tony can go to bed.

Tony also doesn't entirely trust Steve to not let Coulson spirit Ward right back to the maximum-security prison he should've been in in the first place. Or to some government-sanctioned torture chamber to pull whatever Ward still knows out of him along with his teeth and fingernails. They have the other Hydra operatives for that (or, rather, Colonel Talbot and his Moustache of Freedom now have the other Hydra operatives for that) but Tony knows that with Ward, it's personal. Personal enough that he wouldn't put it past Coulson to get the pliers out on behalf of everyone Ward willingly put a bullet through.

Steve has principles. He might not help Colson take Ward. But, Ward's pretty much the reason Bucky's brain is currently malfunctioning. Steve might give Ward to Coulson just to get him the hell out of Bucky's orbit.

So, yeah. Tony's not really feeling the urge to leave Ward behind. "J," he says. "Can you please alert the staff on call that we're bringing Grant Ward to the medical suite, and let them know what to expect?"

"Certainly, sir," J.A.R.V.I.S. responds with his wonderful immediacy. "But Dr. Massi and her assistants are already in the suite. Ms. Potts brought James Barnes to see the doctor an hour ago."

Steve goes completely still. "Why? What's wrong?"

"James Barnes woke at approximately two-forty am complaining of a severe headache, and his temperature is elevated. He's just finished an MRI examination."

"Magnetic Resonance Imaging," Tony murmurs, in case Steve hasn't heard of it. "Like, a way better X-ray."

"I know," Steve says, but not like he's annoyed Tony told him. "Is James sick?" he asks J.A.R.V.I.S.

"I'm afraid I have no further information, Captain."

"Thank you anyway, J.A.R.V.I.S.," Steve says, unfailingly polite. His shield's on his back, but his left arm twitches like he wants to be carrying it, maybe throw it at something. Tony knows exactly how he feels.

"You know how kids are, he probably just has the flu," Tony says. He wonders who the hell he's trying to convince, considering even he doesn't believe it.

"Bucky doesn't get sick," Steve says.

They make a solemn, anxious pair going into the med suite. Ward is still dead to the world, but a couple of nurses push up one of the nearly unbreakable cots he designed as soon as Tony walks through the doors. With the EMP bugs the poor bastard's not going anywhere, so Tony isn't worried about leaving him with the nurses for when they'll wheel Ward off to take blood samples and get him ready for his own MRI, which also being Stark-designed won't fuck up his arms and legs.

He lays Ward down carefully and straightens up in time to see Pepper come in from the MRI room, leading James by the hand. She's carrying a small plastic bag with the other.

"Oh, hey," Tony says, simultaneously happy and worried. Pepper was talking softly to James, but Tony can tell just by the way she's _walking_ how concerned she is. And James looks grey and glazed and lank, except for the unhealthy flush across his cheeks. He's all curled into his hoodie like he's cold, but he's a super soldier and the med suite is always warm.

Pepper looks at Tony and her relieved smile is only a little tight around the edges. Then she sees Ward, and lets out a tiny gasp and snaps her head back to James, who of course has seen Ward as well.

"It's okay. He's drugged to the gills. He can't hurt you," Tony says, because James has gone utterly, dangerously still. He's looking at Ward and there's no expression on his face except the fear in his eyes.

"Let's go, honey. We should get you back to bed," Pepper says to him. She takes a step, tugging gently at his hand. But James is far stronger and he might as well be made of stone. Tony can see his breathing speed up, like he's about to run.

"Get him out of here," Tony says to the nurses, who kind of froze when James did, like prey. To their credit they don't hesitate, pulling the cot through the nearest set of doors and out of sight. Tony makes a mental note to make sure he's paying them enough. "It's okay," he says again to James, because the kid still hasn't moved and Tony has no clue what's going on inside his skull other than that it really, really can't be good.

James just shakes his head. "It's not," he says, voice distant and very afraid. "It's not. It's not. He—"

"James, it's all right." Steve says, coming closer. James' immediately whips his gaze to him. "You're safe. Ward isn't going to hurt anyone. He's here so we can help him, the way you were helped last year."

"I'm not scared of him," James says. He actually looks scared of _Steve,_ Tony thinks, but that makes no sense at all and a second later the fear's gone anyway. All of it so completely absent that now Tony's wondering if he even saw it in the first place. "I just didn't know he was there."

"Okay," Steve says, looking like he wants to be relieved but isn't sure he should be. He comes closer, puts his hand on James' arm. "J.A.R.V.I.S. said you weren't feeling well. What's wrong?"

James shrugs. "My head hurts, and Pepper said I was too hot."

"You were too hot, honey." Pepper puts her hand on James' forehead, but he squirms away, letting go of her hand and moving out of Steve's reach as well. "Remember when I took your temperature? It was 102, then 102.3 when Dr. Massi took it again. She says that it shouldn't be higher than 100."

"Yeah," Steve says. "You and I tend to run hot, but not that hot." He looks at Pepper. "What did the doctor say?"

She presses her lips together unhappily. "She couldn't find anything obvious, but she took swabs and some blood. James was very brave," Pepper adds, smiling at him with genuine pride. "He hates needles, but he let her take blood anyway."

"Nice going," Steve says, smiling at him.

James isn't paying attention. He looks at the space where Ward was, then rubs his forehead in a move Tony's seen far too many times over the last few days. It knocks the hood so it slips down to James' shoulders. "Can we go, please? I don't feel well."

"Of course we can," Pepper says. She smoothes a messy hank of hair out of James' eyes. "Do you want to come back to our place? Or do you want to go with Steve?"

Tony can't help how possessive he feels—Steve has Bucky, but James is _his_ damn it—but he's trying to be responsible and act like an adult, so he mentally crumples the feeling into a ball and stamps on it a few times until he's able to force a smile when James looks at him. "It's your choice, kiddo. I'm just sorry you're not feeling well." He's more than sorry; he's anxious as hell. But he knows enough not to tell James that.

James blinks a few times, like he missed what Tony said. He rubs his forehead again, then shoves both hands into the pouch of his hoodie. He turns back to Steve. "Can I go with you?"

For a moment Steve looks so happy it's kind of heartbreaking. "I'd be honored," he says, and holds out his hand.

"Thanks," James says, but he doesn't take it.

Steve lets it drop to his side.

"Dr. Massi gave him some extremely potent antipyretics and analgesics about ten minutes ago," Pepper tells Steve, handing him the bag. She's rubbing James' shoulder. Tony's not sure she knows she's doing it. "They're from Stark Industries' medical division, designed especially for humans with extremely fast metabolisms. She was fairly confident they'd help with the fever and pain. The instructions are on the bottles."

"Thank you," Steve says.

"How are you feeling, kiddo? Any better?" Tony asks James.

"A little," James says.

Steve gives James a small smile. "What did the MRI say?" he asks Pepper.

Pepper shakes her head. "Nothing yet. The MRI results will take at least an hour."

"Okay," Steve says, like he's steeling himself. "I'll wait to hear from her, then. I'm Bucky's medical proxy anyway."

"I know," Pepper says, grimacing a little. "I would have waited for you to bring him here, but I didn't know when you were getting back, and James was in a lot of pain."

"No, it's fine," Steve says quickly. "I really appreciate you looking after him."

"Can we _please_ go?" James says.

"Yes, absolutely. Sorry," Steve says. He puts his hand on James' shoulder. "We're just worried about you. Super soldiers aren't supposed to get sick."

"I know," James says. He moves out of Steve's gentle grip. "But I'm a kid."

"That's true," Steve says, like he doesn't know James means it.

* * *

Pepper watches the two of them leave, fighting the urge to go after them and make sure Steve reads the labels on the medicine bottles, or to tell him that James asked for milk before he went to bed that evening and he might want some more, or to make sure he doesn't watch anything too scary if he doesn't want to sleep.

Or just to give James a hug. He seemed so frightened for a moment there, before the nurses took Ward away. But seeing James with Steve was a forcible reminder that James might be a child but Bucky is an adult, and in love with Steve. All of a sudden it felt terribly inappropriate to hug him.

And Steve and Bucky have been looking after each other for a long time.

Tony watches them leave too, looking a lot like Pepper feels. He squints his eyes shut, then scrubs his face with his hand. "Fuck, what a mess." He turns to her and grins tiredly. "Except you. You're perfect, as always. How are you always so perfect?"

Pepper thinks of her messy ponytail and how she's wearing slipper-socks and one of Tony's _Stark Expo_ sweatshirts over her pajamas and gives a very imperfect snort. "You are obviously in terrible need of sleep."

"Yeah." Tony nods like he can feel the weight of every single minute of the last three days. He rubs one eye. "I need to go to the workshop, though. I was thinking about the James Extraction Problem,"—Pepper can hear the capital letters—"and I've got a couple ideas…"

"No," she says, gently but firmly. "Not until you've had at least eight hours of sleep." She takes him by the hand and starts walking out of the med suite, and the fact that Tony just meekly follows shows her exactly how exhausted he is. "Bruce and I did some research on the James Extraction Problem ourselves,"—he grins at her using his terminology, just like she hoped—"while you were gone this…yesterday morning. And we may've found something. But I'm not discussing it with you now," she adds quickly when Tony perks up. "Not until you've slept."

"You're just cruel," he sighs.

"Yes I am."

Tony looks at her, making big, hopeful puppy eyes. "Can you tell me a little bit? While we're in the elevator?"

Pepper rolls her eyes, but she can't help the laugh. "You're like a toddler. No wonder you like kids so much." She takes his arm, wishing she could lean her head on his shoulder, but with his suit on it'd be uncomfortable. She starts walking, leading Tony out of the med suite.

"Takes one to know one," Tony says, kissing her cheek.

* * *

"How are you feeling? Do you want anything? Are you hungry? I know it's early, but…" Steve smiles kind of halfway, which James knows means he's not really happy at all. "Are you okay?"

"I'm fine," James says. He makes sure he's standing up straight like a grown-up, and he doesn't touch his head or squint his eyes, even though everything looks too bright and his head really, really hurts and he's frightened.

Bucky's still in the grey place that means he's there but mostly not. James wishes Bucky was _all_ there, out in front like he should be, so that James could go to the grey place instead. Or the white one, like where Vanya is: silent and safe with nothing hurting. James could get Vanya out if he wanted, if he pushed. Vanya could help, maybe. Maybe take over for a while. But bringing Vanya out would be really hard, and James is so tired.

But James doesn't need Bucky in front to hear him. James has always been able to hear Bucky, even when Bucky didn't know. And right now he's saying, _pretend. You gotta pretend. If you don't they'll know you're a kid and they'll just hurt you worse. You can't let 'em know, James. If they find out you'll die._ And James can feel Bucky thinking about the lab and the Red Room and Zola and his devices and Pierce and his chair. And he doesn't want to have to take pain like that again. His head hurts bad enough.

Steve doesn't look like he believes him, but James holds his head up and smiles and pretends and tries to be brave even though the others are the brave ones, not him. And he says, "I'm fine, really, but I don't want to sleep anymore. I'm going to watch a movie," and Steve finally nods and smiles a little more and James did it. It's all right for now.

"Sounds good. I'm going to get some shuteye," Steve says. He's still smiling, but it's not real. James can see that in Steve's eyes. Steve's still wearing his helmet, even, like he's afraid to let James see his whole face.

It's because Steve doesn't want James to know how sad he is that Bucky's not in front anymore. Steve loves Bucky, not James. James knows that, just like he knows that Sergeant Barnes ( _is pacing like a cat in a cage how could they have been so stupid they brought that fucking **thing** in here he's just like the Asset they both need to be to be put down let me out **let me out LET ME OUT**_ ) is angry, or how Vanya's in the white silence or the Asset is waiting.

James knows all kinds of things. And he knows Steve wants to help because he thinks he's helping Bucky, even though Bucky doesn't need anything.

That's okay, though. James knows Steve won't hurt him, and James is pretending too, so it's like that makes it fair.

Steve leads him to the guestroom, gets him a glass of water and some of Bucky's clothes, and then tells him to just holler if he needs anything. Steve stands in the doorway for a second, looking at James like he wants to say something but he isn't sure it's a good idea.

"Do you want me to stay?" he asks.

James does. He knows Steve just as well as Bucky does and Sergeant Barnes does, and James loves him just as much as they do, only different. But he shakes his head and says, "No, that's okay," anyway.

"All right," Steve says. "I'll see you later, then. Just…" He tries to smile. "If you need me I'll be here."

"Thank you," James says.

Steve looks even more sad when he walks away. And tired, like the shield on his back weighs too much.

James waits 'til Steve is gone, then he closes the door and pulls the hoodie off 'cause he's too hot and curls up tight on the bed with his shaking hands on the sides of his head. He tries not to cry despite how much it hurts, because he needs to pretend. This is why he didn't go with Pepper and Tony. They're almost what James always thought a real mom and dad would be like, and they wouldn't let him be by himself. They'd _know._

They'd know that Sergeant Barnes is fighting so hard to get in front that it feels like a war inside of James' skull. It feels like his whole brain is coming apart or his head's gonna explode. Barnes saw the other Asset and he wants out so bad so he can protect Steve that it feels like James is dying. And James was terrified of letting Steve touch him, because Barnes loves Steve so much and he's so worried about him that maybe it would've made him strong enough to get in front again.

If that happens James knows he won't be able to shove Barnes back anymore. And he promised Tony he wouldn't let Barnes be in front, because if Barnes gets out all of them will die.

_Please, Bucky,_ he thinks, _come back, please come back. Help me._ But Bucky's too deep in grey to understand.

Vanya could take over. He's strong enough to hold Barnes back, but he's too far in the white. It'd be too hard to get him.

Tears leak out of the corners of James' eyes, but he stays quiet. Noise will alert the guards, and if he can't pretend they'll make it hurt even more—

"Let me out, for fuck's sake!" Barnes says. He's standing in front of the door in his Howling Commandos uniform. He looks like his head hurts too, and his nose is bleeding. He wipes it with the back of his hand, then scowls at the red smear. "I ain't gonna hurt ya', ya knucklehead. I know what I'm doing."

A warm, wet trail leaks out of James' nose and when he licks his upper lip he tastes blood. "Stop," he says, very, very softly. "P-please. Please, s-stop."

"I'm sorry, kid," Barnes says, and James can feel how much he means it. "I'll go behind you and Bucky right after, promise. I'll be so quiet you won't even know I'm there. But I have to get out."

James shakes his head.

Barnes bares his teeth and makes an animal noise of anger and effort, and he _pushes_ and James is going to slip, he's going to fall, but he can't and he _promised_ …

James turns away from Barnes in desperation and reaches out his hand.

The Asset uncoils and stands and reaches back.

* * *

Steve's standing on the floor with his shield in his hand before he fully registers the crash that woke him.

He stays that way for less than half a second, blinking in the light of early dawn. He expected to be fighting for his life, but there's nothing remotely threatening in the room. It's raining, he remembers the dark peals of thunder starting shortly before he fell asleep. But this didn't sound like thunder. It wasn't J.A.R.V.I.S. either, though Steve told the A.I. to get him up as soon as the results of the MRI were ready.

And then the crashing sound comes again, followed by a cry of anger and pain. It's in the guestroom.

"Bucky!" Steve hefts his shield and races down the hall. The guestroom door is still closed, but it's caved outward with a huge crack peaking the middle like a mountain range. The crack explodes just as Steve gets there, wood blasted away by Bucky's metal elbow, but he just roars and disappears back inside.

Steve doesn't know what's going on, but it's obvious that Bucky's in one hell of a fight. Steve grabs the remaining pieces of the door and heaves them aside instead of kicking the door in and possibly hitting Bucky. He goes in with his shield up and ready to help Bucky with his attackers, but Bucky's the only one there.

And he's the only one destroying the room, and himself along with it.

Bucky smashes into the remaining unbroken wall before Steve can even move to prevent it. The impact takes off a chunk of drywall and cracks the concrete beneath it.

Bucky's hoodie is on the bed and the tee-shirt he was wearing underneath is a tattered mess on the floor. His unprotected skin is already bruised and slashed in more places than Steve can count, bleeding heavily. There's a particularly bad bruise reddening Bucky's right cheek on the same side he just slammed into the wall. His nose doesn't look broken but it's bleeding badly too.

"Bucky!" Steve calls, but it's like Bucky can't see or hear him.

Bucky screams like an animal, then twists violently to the side so his back is against the window, left hand fisted and thumping against the glass. The material is reinforced, strong enough to handle even a blast of Thor's lightning. But hairline cracks are forming under the onslaught of Bucky's fist. 

Nightmare, Steve thinks. It has to be. "Bucky, Bucky! Wake up! Bucky!"

Bucky doesn't even look at him. He groans through his teeth, clenched fist hitting the glass again and again. If this were his flesh and blood hand he would've already smashed it to pulp.

"JAMES!" Steve yells, finally remembering that it's not Bucky, of course it's not. If it were Bucky none of this living hell would be happening. "James! James, No! Stop!" He drops his shield and rushes forward just as the glass finally shatters. James' metal hand breaks off a shard, and Steve knows immediately what James is going to do with it. "No!" Steve grabs his metal wrist with both hands so James won't stab himself. The metal is hot. "Drop it!"

James crushes the glass in his hand. His eyes jump to Steve's, but they're empty of everything but cold determination. Then he kicks Steve in his knee.

Steve cries out in much as surprise as pain. He staggers back but doesn't fall, tries to get his shield, but James steps on the edge first and makes it leap up so he can yank it onto his arm. Then he thrusts the shield at Steve like he intends to take Steve's head off with it.

Steve grabs the edge of his shield with both hands, tries to yank it out of James' grip, but James kicks him again in the same knee.

The joint gives out, but before Steve goes down he launches himself backwards with his good leg. He hits the mattress with most of his back, then rolls into a somersault that returns him to his feet on the other side of the room from James.

James throws Steve's shield at him with his left hand, aiming for his head again. Balanced on one leg, Steve can only dodge and let the shield go flying past him and out the empty doorframe. He hears it imbed itself in the corridor wall.

"James, it's me, Steve! I'm not going to hurt you."

James runs at him with a growl and tackles like he did on the helicarrier, carrying him out into the hallway. The back of Steve's head hits the wall and he's not sure if the violent _crack_ he hears is the concrete or his skull, but it dazes him almost long enough for James to drive his left fist through Steve's face.

Steve catches his wrist before James can kill him. The metal is still astonishingly hot, like it's malfunctioning. "James," he gasps, "James, it's me. You're safe. Please, snap out of it!"

James just yanks his lips back in a snarl. "You attacked him."

Steve stares at him. "What?"

"You attacked him!" James brings his right fist down like a hammer on Steve's chest. Part of his sternum cracks like his skull and the wind is blasted out of him and he can't breathe.

Steve elbows James in the temple hard enough to hurt, hoping the shock of it might get his attention.

Except this isn't James. It can't be. James would never do this. "Bucky! Sergeant Barnes, stand down!" Steve tries, but all he gets is another enraged growl and fist to his sternum that Steve barely manages to block with his arm.

"Who the hell is Barnes?" 

"Oh, fuck," Steve breathes. Then he elbows the Asset in the temple again, this time as hard as he can.

The blow makes those icy, inhuman eyes glaze a little so Steve elbows him again, and again. The fourth time he's able to shove the Asset off him and lurch to his feet. His left leg hurts but it can still hold him. Breathing, however, is extremely unpleasant. And when the Asset stands up there's nothing but frozen anger in Bucky's blue eyes.

"James! James," Steve calls, "come back! Shove him out!"

"Don't call me that!" The Asset goes for another full-body tackle. Steve drops to his back, then kicks up with his good leg, catching the Asset in the chest.

The kick throws him the length of the corridor and into the living room. The Asset hits the floor with a thud that feels like it shakes the whole building, but the floors are practically sound-proof. Unless the other Avengers are in the ceiling vents or the stairwells they likely won't hear a damn thing.

J.A.R.V.I.S. can alert them all, but Steve doesn't want Bucky to get hurt. And he would, badly. Steve knows the Asset wasn't conditioned to let anyone capture him. He'd fight to the death first.

"I'm not a threat to James," Steve says, pulling himself to his feet. He needs to get his shield. "I'm his friend. I was trying to stop him from stabbing himself with the glass."

"You attacked him." The Asset gets up faster than Steve, but he has an arm across his stomach and he's panting like the last kick hurt. He wipes his nose with his forearm, streaking the metal red from his wrist nearly to his elbow. For a moment he wobbles on his feet, but then he focuses and comes right at Steve like a stalking wolf. "What did you do to my head?"

"Nothing!" Steve rips his shield out of the wall, holding it in front of him ready to catch the next blow. His leg's getting better but he's dizzy and it hurts to breathe like he's having an asthma attack. "You're sick, that's why your head hurts and your nose is bleeding. Please let me help."

"I don't get sick." The Asset throws another brutal left-handed punch at Steve. Steve braces behind the shield but the impact makes him skid backwards, his bare feet sliding on the wooden floor. His hurt leg almost gives out.

"Bucky, please!" Steve shoves hard with his shield and the Asset stumbles back a few steps. "Stop doing this!"

"I'm not Bucky!" the Asset leaps at him. Steve blocks with his shield but the Asset grabs the edge with both his hands, then jumps so he can kick off on the nearer wall and flip over Steve's head and land behind him, still holding the shield. Steve gets wrenched sideways. He can't stop himself from being smacked into the wall, and then the Asset yanks the shield aside with his right hand, just enough to jab his left fist into Steve's temple like a bullet.

And then nothing.

* * *

The Asset leans against the wall, panting heavily. He wipes his nose again, noting the large amount of blood. He didn't take much damage in the fight, but he's still in a lot of pain. His joints ache and his head hurts so badly that he's worried the child will have to resume control soon to deal with it.

He's too hot.

It's likely that he's been poisoned, though he doesn't remember the target having the time to do that during the fight. At least the target's neutralized.

Not good enough. His training demands that the target should be dead, not just incapacitated. And Steve Rogers is ( _His ally; his leader; his friend; his lover_ ) his mission. If he returns to base without proof of death he'll be punished. They'll use the chair.

If they use the chair on him then the child will have to take point. He can't let that happen. The Asset's only unchanging mission is to protect the child. He has to avoid punishment.

Steve Rogers has to die.

The Asset thumps to his knees next to the target, too weak to control his body. He needs to complete his mission quickly, before the poison makes him unable to function.

He slides his left hand behind the target's neck. One, quick twist will sever the spine. The kill will be painless and clean.

The Asset hesitates. But there's no reason to hesitate.

The man in the blue jacket is screaming, throwing himself against the bars of his cage. The Asset was able to overpower Blue Jacket and cage him when Rogers came into the room and accidentally distracted him. Blue Jacket is a vicious, dangerous fighter, and he wants the Asset dead.

As soon as the Asset's completed his mission, he needs to neutralize Blue Jacket as well. He's not sure he'll be able to defeat Blue Jacket if he gets free and attacks again, especially with the Asset's functioning impeded like this.

At least right now Blue Jacket is caged and not a threat. But keeping him locked inside is exhausting, and making the Asset's weakness and pain worse.

He'd like the child to take point, but the child is in cyrostasis now, almost as frozen as the Winter Soldier. He won't reemerge unless the Asset's in enough pain, and he's currently not in enough pain. Nor does he intend to be, since that would go against the Asset's mission to protect the child.

"Don't! No! Steve! Steve, wake up! Don't you fucking hurt him, you son of a bitch!" Blue Jacket screams and kicks and hits and flails and the pain ratchets up and a large gobbet of blood falls from the Asset's nose, splattering on the target's shield.

The Asset tries to ignore Blue Jacket, tries to complete his mission, but it's as if his left hand is malfunctioning. He can't move it, can't break Steve Rogers' neck. He tries again, harder, and he—

Wakes up standing several feet away from the target. He doesn't remember moving.

Was he in the chair again? He looks around quickly, expecting blank walls and black-suited handlers with guns and Alexander Pierce giving him his next mission. But he's still in the target's ( _his; their_ ) apartment.

"The mission's over. Get back."

The Asset looks to his right, and there's someone else in front of the living room window. Another man, dressed almost identically to the Asset's standard uniform (he's currently wearing soft blue cotton pants that tie with a drawstring and bare feet. He doesn't know why he's not in his armor). Except he's unmasked, and in place of the red star on his left shoulder he has a circle in the same design and colors as the target's shield.

He's shaking like he's just come out of cyrostasis, blood leaking from his nostrils.

"My mission isn't over," the Asset says. "The target is still alive."

"He's supposed to be alive," the other says. He reminds the Asset of Blue Jacket. He's not screaming, but he's just as much of a threat. The Asset can see it in his stance, in the way the other looks him over, assessing weakness. The Asset knows he's showing far too much weakness right now. "He's not your mission anymore. Get back."

The Asset draws back his lips. "Liar." He tries to go back to the target, but the other grits his teeth and clenches his fists and the Asset can't move. "Let me go."

"No. Get back."

"No!"

The other lets out a yell of anger and runs towards him, head down and fists still clenched. The Asset shifts to face him, gets ready to fight, and they meet—


	7. Chapter 7

Bucky Barnes cries out and falls to his knees, clutching his head because it feels like it's about to blow apart. His nose is bleeding like a damn faucet and he hasn't felt this hot and sick since…

There's a flash of blue out of the corner of his eye and Bucky jerks his mind back from Zola and the prison camp like yanking his hand back from a fire.

He can't let Sergeant Barnes come out again. He just needs to get to Steve.

He staggers up, swaying badly and nearly falling again, but he manages to take the few steps so that when his legs give out he's next to Steve. Bucky shakily tugs the shield off his arm and sets it aside, then fumbles for Steve's pulse at his throat.

Steve's skin feels horribly cold and Bucky can't feel a pulse with how badly his hands are trembling. He tries to listen for a breath, a heartbeat, but there's a roaring in Bucky's ears like the storm outside, and even with the side of his head on Steve's chest he's not sure if the throbbing is Steve's heart or Bucky's surging pulse. He's not sure if Steve's alive or dead.

Maybe Steve's dead. Maybe Bucky killed him.

 _the Asset killed him,_ Bucky thinks desperately. But no, he knows better than that.

It's him. Bucky. It's only ever been him. He's such a fucking coward that he fucked up his own mind, broke himself apart. Fucked up everything.

He's hurt so many people. He's hurt _Steve_ , and all because instead of facing…what they did to him like a man, he buried himself in his head and let Zola and the Red Room and Hydra use him however they wanted.

He thought he was fixed but he should've known he was too messed up. He's always been messed up. Messed up even before he fell (got pushed) down the stairs. But he was stupid enough to think he'd be all right. And now look what he's done.

Steve might be dead because of him.

Bucky lets out a tiny, awful noise and lurches to his feet, falling heavily against the wall. He opens his mouth to ask J.A.R.V.I.S. if Steve's alive, but maybe Steve really isn't and Bucky can't know. He can't know. He has to get out of there, away from him. Before he hurts him again.

Bucky pushes away from the wall, then manages to put one foot in front of the other until by the time he's at the stairwell he's almost running.

"J.A.R.V.I.S.," he says, trying to sound normal, strong, not choke on each word. "This is the Winter Soldier—32557. The tower's been infiltrated. They must'a got past your sensors. Steve's on our floor, he's down." _Not dead, not dead, he can't be dead_. "He needs medical attention. I'm going to intercept on the roof. Initiate lockdown and seal access to the roof and stairwell once I'm out there. No one in or out until I give the okay, got it?"

"Voice authorization recognized and the medical suite has been notified." The A.I. sounds unsure, though, maybe because nobody's busted into Avengers Tower since it was built. "But I'll need your retinal scan, Sergeant."

Thank God Steve's gonna get help, but Bucky still can't make himself ask if he's alive. He stops at the next floor to let the beam scan over his eye. "That good enough? I need you to keep 'em contained, J."

He can practically hear the A.I. waffling, but Steve said that Tony got paranoid after his mansion in Malibu was blasted to bits, so Bucky's grateful but not surprised when J.A.R.V.I.S. ends up complying.

The alarm is like railroad spikes in his already aching head, but Bucky was expecting it so he just grits his teeth and keeps running. Only about sixteen more floors.

Tony's designed the stairwell with something like airlocks at each landing. Along with the door to go out onto the floor of the building, there's also one to access the stairs going up and down. The idea is to trap any enemies between floors.

So far it looks like it's gonna work pretty well. Bucky can hear the _shush-thunk_ of all the doors locking tight as he goes through each landing. The other Avengers will be able to get through as well but they'll need retinal scans, which will slow them down a little bit. That's all he needs.

He bursts out onto the flat walkway to the round landing platform on the roof in an explosion of rain. It's hard and cold and for a moment he doesn't—he doesn't know where he is. The wind up here is brutal and the rain is falling almost horizontally, stinging like ice against his skin. And he's soaking wet and shaking and the rain is thick and heavy like he's being crushed under the sky.

And he looks up and he's falling but he already fell and there's blood in his mouth and all around him, washing away in the river and Sergeant Barnes is gone and James, poor James is _screaming_ …

Bucky's on his side in the layer of rainwater that covers the entire landing platform, taste of concrete and chemicals and blood in his mouth. He pushes back to his knees, then scrambles to his feet, _away away away get away_ thrumming frantically through his head without him even knowing what he's running from anymore. The heat in his body's drained out of him like blood in a river, and he's so cold now his teeth are chattering. Like there's winter inside him.

His feet slip in the water. The wind is making waves in the inches-deep pool covering his feet, throwing so much rain at him it's hard to see. It's storming like the end of the world, lightning drawing bright cracks across the sky. Maybe Avengers Tower will get hit. Maybe that would kill him.

That'd be fine.

The landing platform is a large circle sticking out at the end of the walkway like a sucker on a wide stick. The railing is low and only goes half-way around the outer rim of the circle. It's to make it easier to land in weather like this, but anyone could just walk right off the edge next to where the railing ends, or just step over it. He's sure Tony and Pepper figured no one would.

Well, they figured wrong, Bucky thinks.

He staggers to the edge.

* * *

Steve wakes up to alarms blaring like air raid sirens.

"What…?" He groans, rolling onto his side then sitting up. His shield is leaning against the wall and his chest and head are really hurting. He touches his temple and comes away with a smear of blood on his fingertips.

"Please stay still, Captain. Medical personnel will be here shortly."

"I'm fine," Steve says automatically, working his legs underneath him. His injured one still hurts, but it's not so bad now. "Why are there alarms?"

"Sergeant Barnes initiated a lockdown, Captain," J.A.R.V.I.S. says. He's got his 'emergency' voice: determined but slightly nervous, and very loud because of the alarms. It makes Steve's head hurt worse. "The tower has been infiltrated."

"What? When?" He pulls himself to his feet. He still has to favor his hurt leg, but the adrenaline is clearing his head and taking care of the pain. Sudden realization jams like an axe wedge into his memory, and he grabs his shield and starts running. "Where's Bucky?"

"He has just reached the roof landing platform to prevent further infiltration, Captain. I've sealed the stairwell and roof access per his instructions. I strongly recommend that you wait for help, to avoid exacerbating your injuries."

"The roof? Why…" Steve sucks air that feels like it has knives in it. "Oh, my God. J.A.R.V.I.S.! There is no infiltration. Restore roof access now. I have to get to him." He's at the landing but the elevator shaft has been closed off with blast doors only Thor or the Hulk can break. Steve goes for the stairs, knows the door will be locked solid but yanks on it anyway. "Let me in! Bucky's in danger, I have to get to him!"

"Voice and retinal scan is required for entry, Captain. Sergeant Barnes specifically instructed—"

"Damn it!" Steve barks out his voice-recognition access code. "There is no infiltration, J.A.R.V.I.S. Shut off the lockdown!" He lets the lock scan him. As soon as it beeps green he shoves his way through to the stairwell, but there's a locked door to access the stairs too.

There are twenty floors between here and the landing platform. At least 40 more doors. He can't take the time for this. "Shut off the lockdown. You have my authorization."

"I'm sorry, Captain." The A.I. really does sound sorry. "But once a lockdown has been initiated, only sir or Ms. Potts has the authority to stop it."

"Then let me talk to them!" Steve gallops up the stairs to the next landing. Then he waits another agonizing five seconds as the scanner reads his eye. Another 19 floors to go. 

"Communications are restricted to personal ear units in the event of the tower being compromised," J.A.R.V.I.S. says.

And Steve's is on the bedside table. Fucking hell. "Please, J.A.R.V.I.S.," he tries again. 18 floors. "Bucky told you the tower's under attack to make you keep the Avengers away from him. He's sick. He doesn't know what he's doing. He might hurt himself." 17 floors. "Please, I'm begging you, J.A.R.V.I.S. Turn off the lockdown so I can get to him."

There's a long, terrible second of silence. Steve goes up another landing, tries not to scream as he waits for the retinal scan. 16. Has the A.I. decided to ignore him? Or—

"I can't find evidence of infiltrators in the tower, or anyone other than Sergeant Barnes on the roof landing platform," J.A.R.V.I.S. says. He sounds confused and anxious, trying to reconcile his sensors with what Bucky told him.

"That's because there are none," Steve says. 15. He's panting a little from the effort of running up stairs with a bad leg and the pain of breathing with a cracked sternum. "Bucky lied to you so you'd slow us down, J. He's sick. He needs help. And you're keeping me from getting to him!"

The alarm goes silent.

"Steve, what the hell's going on?" Tony says over the general comm in the stairwell.

Steve lets out a painful breath of relief. "The Asset got control of Bucky's body and attacked me. Then J.A.R.V.I.S. says Bucky told him the tower'd been infiltrated and initiated a lockdown. He's on the roof, and he's burning up with fever. I'm trying to get up there, but the stairwell's sealed off."

13 more floors.

"J.A.R.V.I.S., open the fucking stairwell," Tony orders, then gives his own code.

All the doors quietly swing open.

"Thank God." Steve goes faster, ignoring the burning in his leg, head, chest. 12; 11.

"I'm closer. I'll meet you out there, Cap," Tony says.

"No, wait!" Steve shouts, then grits his teeth at the jab in his ribs. "The Asset attacked me, Tony. And I don't know who's up there now."

"Oh, fuck me," Tony says. "My armor's about thirty levels below me. Suiting up's going to take a minute."

"I'm almost there anyway," Steve says. 8; 7. "Keep the others away. If he feels cornered he might—"

"Jump or rip someone's head off. Or both," Tony grimly fills in for him. "Gotcha. Hey, wait. You just said he attacked you. Are you okay?"

"I'm fine."

6; 5; 4.

"Yeah, shouldn't've asked."

3; 2.

"I'm here," Steve says.

1.

* * *

It's raining so hard that it feels like a lead blanket drops on him the instant Steve steps out into the open. The landing platform is awash in so much water that he slides then groans in pain when catching himself jars his hurt knee. Steve's soaking almost instantly, squinting to see through the wall of rain. There's a huge clap of thunder so close that it sounds like an explosion.

And there's Bucky, at the far end of the circular landing platform. He has his back to the building on the wrong side of the low, flimsy rail. He's holding onto it with both hands, shoulders and head bowed under the onslaught of rain. He must be standing on the jutting rail that sticks out underneath. Steve has no idea how he can keep his footing like that. And if he slips…

Fear grips him like ice, stealing his breath like he's dying. "Bucky!" Steve calls, but he feels like he can't breathe and with the constant roar of the water there's no way Bucky can hear him. Steve drops his shield and runs, ignoring the aches of his injuries as he skids in the water. "Bucky! _Bucky!_ "

"Steve!" Bucky looks over his shoulder at him, but his expression of relief and joy is gone so fast it's like it's been washed away by the unending deluge. "Stop. Stop moving. Please. I mean it," he says when Steve's about five feet away. His voice is pitched to carry above the rain, deadly serious in a way Steve can't ignore.

Steve stops. He's too far; he's always too far. "Bucky, please. Let me help you."

"Don't come any closer," Bucky says. "If you come closer he'll take over again. And he's already—" His words cut on a groan of pain. He looks away, head hanging. This close Steve can see how badly Bucky's trembling. His flesh arm seems barely able to hang on. "I nearly killed you! I can't…It's takin' everything I got to keep 'em back, Steve. Please don't make it worse."

"James?" Steve says. He's reaching out with both hands even though he's too far to touch. "James, please, come back over the rail."

The response to that is only like a laugh the way a drop is like an ocean. "Sorry. James ain't here right now. You're gonna have to settle for Bucky."

Steve swallows around the dreadful hope lodged like a knife in his throat. "Bucky?"

"The one and only," Bucky says. "Or, the one and many, I guess." His smirk sounds cold as the rain.

"Bucky! God…" Steve steps closer. "I've really missed you. Can, can you please come back over the rail?"

Bucky doesn't move. His hair is plastered to his scalp, black in the grey daylight. His back is nearly white and mottled with rising bruises and the washed-out red of cuts. "It'd be a hell of a crash down, wouldn't it, from this height?" Bucky looks at Steve again. His eyes are like dull pits of ice in a face pale as snow where it's not marred by injury. There's a constant stream of translucent crimson under his nostrils, rinsing out with the water pouring over him. "Think it's enough to finally kill me?"

"I'd really rather not find out, Buck," Steve says. He smiles so he won't frighten him, even though Steve hasn't been this terrified since he was trying to reach for him outside a blasted-open train car. "How 'bout you come back here so we don't have to?"

Bucky shakes his head, looks away. "I just want it to stop, Steve. I-I've got a fucking war in my head and it won't _stop_. And it's not gonna go away, is it." He says it like it's a truth, not a question. "I mean, if the _Asgard_ can't fix me, then who the hell can, right? Should've figured. I'm too fucked up."

"No you're not, Bucky." Steve's trying not to sound desperate, knows he's failing. He glances behind him but Tony's not there. It's just him and his fear and the storm. "We didn't know about Sergeant Barnes, before. Now that we do we can take you back there, fix it again—"

" _You can't fix me,_ " Bucky grits out. "They already tried. And I don't want to go another year thinking it'll be okay just to end up like this again. It hurts. I'm sick of fighting." His laugh is thin and desperate. "You can't fix what started out broken."

"Don't say that! Don't you dare say that! God damn it, Buck, you're the best man I know. I love you."

"Yeah, well, you always did go for the lost causes." Bucky shakes his head. "I must've been born wrong, or somethin'. Fucked up in the head. I mean, what kind of person lets people turn 'em into a monster, huh?"

"You were never a monster," Steve says immediately. "Just the people who…who hurt you."

"Who made me into a killer," Bucky says. "See? You can't even say it 'cause you know it's true. And I just let them. I gave up. Found some nice, quiet corner of my skull and just…went to sleep while I murdered—" His voice hitches. "I hurt so many people, Steve."

"No, Bucky. That wasn't you."

"Of course it was me!" Bucky looks at Steve so sharply that one of his feet slips off the metal and for a moment he's almost hanging.

Steve lunges for him, but Bucky cries out in pain.

" _Don't touch me,_ " he snarls. "The Asset's fighting me like a fucking rabid dog and he wants to _kill_ you! I'm trying to keep him down but it fucking _hurts_ and you're not making it easier, okay? So back off. Please!"

"Yeah, okay. Sure," Steve rasps. He backs up a step. "It wasn't you, Bucky."

"I made 'em all, Stevie," Bucky says. He sounds worse than defeated. He sounds…dead. Like every spark of life inside him is gone. "I made James, and Barnes, and…well, I didn't make Vanya but it doesn't matter 'cause I just rolled over and let the Ruskies shove him into my brain. And I sure as fuck made the Asset. Which means he's part of me, right? So yeah, it was me."

"James made the Asset to protect you."

Bucky snorts. "Really not interested in arguing fucking semantics, here."

"But you're interested in killing yourself?" Steve snaps. He feels completely helpless, as out of control as the storm. "What're you going to do, Buck? Throw yourself off the tower?"

Bucky laughs, low and ugly. "Stevie, the only reason I'm not kissin' pavement right now is I can't make my fucking hands let go."

"Oh, my God," Steve gasps. "Bucky, no. Please. We can figure this out. We can find something. Don't do this. Please. Don't leave me. Not again. I-I couldn't—"

"I'm sorry. I'm really sorry." Bucky sounds so sad, like this is something inevitable. "I don't want to hurt you again. But I can't do this anymore. I just want it to stop. It hurts so fucking much and it won't _stop._ "

"Bucky, please. You're sick. You've got a fever and you're not thinking straight. That's why it hurts. Please, come back inside with me and let us help you. Don't do this!"

Bucky goes on like he can't even hear him. "I should've died for real the first time. Couldn't even get that right. I wish I had. I wish I never made it off the helicarrier. You'd be so better off without me."

"That's not true," Steve says. Each word is like a gut-punch with how much he means it. "That's not true. I love you. You…you're everything. You don't know what it was like, being here without you with me. I can't do that again, Buck. Please don't make me do that again."

"I almost killed you," Bucky says. The breath stutters out of his lungs and Steve realizes he's crying. "I almost killed you! What if I can't stop next time? What'll I do then?" He shakes his head violently. "It's not worth it. I'm not worth it. All I ever do is hurt everyone."

He pulls against the rail. "Why…can't…I…let… _go?_ "

"Because you don't really want to die." Steve edges closer. "If you did, you would've just walked…you'd already be gone, like you said. Deep down, you want to live." He swallows. "That's the Bucky Barnes I've loved since we were little kids. You're not broken, Bucky. You're a survivor. And that's why you're not going to let go."

"I'm sorry," Bucky says. He pulls harder, groaning in effort. The metal starts to deform under his left hand.

Steve grits his teeth, hating what he's about to do. "Sergeant Barnes, take over. Take over from Bucky and get your ass back to safety now."

He can hear Bucky's hissed breath. "No! No! Don't!" Bucky turns to glare at him, eyes stark and wild. He clenches his jaw the way he did when Steve made James take over from Barnes. More blood comes from his nose, evident even with the rain. Bucky cries out and his expression goes vacant. His feet slip, then so does his right hand. He screams in terror as he falls into the space between the bars of the lower railing.

"No!" Steve grabs for him so fast he nearly flips himself over the barrier. He smacks one hand over Bucky's wrist, extending the other. "Bucky! Grab my hand!"

Bucky tries to heave his right hand close enough for Steve to grab it, tries to lift his feet back to the railing, but it seems to take all his strength just to hang on. He looks up at Steve with blank terror in his eyes. Steve's never seen him so afraid. "Help me."

This must be Sergeant Barnes, Steve thinks. Bucky wanted to die.

"I got you. I won't let you fall." Steve reaches farther, close to overbalancing himself. Barnes' metal wrist is so hot that Steve can see little puffs of steam. It's slick as ice, nothing to get a grip on, and the railing Barnes' left fist is desperately wrapped around is damaged, giving way. Steve's dizzy and his chest is aching with the pull of his muscles over his cracked sternum. His kicked knee is throbbing in time with the frantic beat of his pulse, threatening to collapse. His body is failing him, and he can't pull Bucky up to safety. 

Steve has the awful understanding that it doesn't matter that he caught Bucky this time; Bucky is still going to fall.

"Bucky, I need you to give me your other hand," he says. He makes his voice determined, hiding how terrified he is. "That's all you have to do. We're going to get you safe. Just swing your right hand up into mine. That's it, that's it," he says when Barnes tries once, then again, and still fails. "Just one more, come on—"

The rail under Barnes' left fist snaps.

Steve cries out and grabs his metal wrist with both his hands. He's badly overbalanced now, feels himself going over as Bucky's weight pulls him down. He desperately wraps his legs around the rail. The angle and the weight are hell on his cracked ribs and every breath is shallow and hurts. His head is aching and his leg is twisting agony. Bucky's wrist is inexorably sliding through Steve's fingers. But he hangs on.

He hears the sound of glass shattering somewhere behind him. And there, at last, is Iron Man, speeding towards them both—

A thick bolt of searing orange light drops from the sky onto the landing platform. The impact rocks the whole building, and the shockwave sends Steve over the rail.

He doesn't let go. They're both falling and he doesn't let go. They're going to die like this and he doesn't even _care…_

Someone grabs his leg.

The sudden stop jars Bucky out of his hands.

Steve's distantly aware of Tony blasting past them and diving like an arrow. He's also aware that Thor is the one who grabbed him, and the one who is still holding him. His arms are wrapped securely around Steve's chest as he bucks and struggles.

Steve knows on some level that Thor's not his enemy, that he just staved Steve's life. But he had Bucky. He _had_ him. And now he's falling and Thor won't let him go—

It takes what feels like a very long time to realize that Thor's speaking to him, and that the inhuman screaming is coming from Steve's own throat.

At some point the rain stopped.

"Please, Steven, cease your struggles. Nothing can be gained by you throwing yourself after him. I am so sorry that my descent from Asgard is responsible for this. I would never knowingly do either of your harm…"

Tony flies up to where they're standing and lands on the round platform. His arms are empty.

Steve goes completely still.

His repulsors shut off and Tony immediately drops to his knees, then to all fours on the sopping roof. His still-dented faceplate flips up and he just…stays like that. Tony's chest heaves like he's not sure if he's going to faint or laugh or throw up or scream.

"Tony?" Thor says. He still has his arms wrapped around Steve's chest, trying to give comfort that Steve can't feel through the anguish crushing him.

Steve can't speak.

"Hulk," Tony says. He gulps, pushes himself back to his knees and looks up at them and Steve realizes that Tony's crying. He flicks off his gauntlets and wipes his eyes roughly with his fingers. "The Hulk caught him. Kind of destroyed the front entrance, but…"

"Bucky is alive?" Thor asks, because Steve still can't say anything.

Tony nods. He rips off his helmet and all but throws it away from him. It bounces and skids on the wet concrete but doesn't go off the edge. "Yeah." He nods, swallows, then looks up at Steve. "I'm sorry. The new security protocols _suck_ , and I promised Pepper I'd keep all my suits in the basement after I almost killed her with one of them." He takes a breath that sounds like it shudders all the way through him. "He would've died, Steve. I couldn't get my fucking suit on, and I wasn't…I couldn't…" he starts shaking, wrapping his arms around himself like despite the armor he's somehow cold. "If Bruce hadn't been there Bucky would be dead." He rubs his eyes with the heels of his hands. "I wasn't fast enough. He would've hit the ground."

"He's alive?" Steve says. He can't believe it. He feels disconnected in the aftermath of adrenaline. Too light, like this isn't really his body. Like he'd disappear if Thor let go of him. Even the pain of his injuries doesn't seem to really belong to him anymore. He's fairly certain he's breathing too fast. "I saw…he…he's okay? Really?"

"Yeah," Tony says. "Yeah. Hulk got him. Don't even think the kid'll have a bruise."

"Thank God," Steve says on a breath that seems to take all his strength with it. He staggers, doesn't fall because Thor still has him. It's strange how he feels as if all of him is trembling like Tony, even though none of him is. "Where is he now? I need to see him. I have to see him." He won't believe it otherwise. He was holding Bucky when he fell.

"Yeah, right. Of course." Tony flicks his gloves back on and climbs to his feet, starts walking. "Hopefully Bucky's in the med suite. But we may have to help Nat convince Hulk to let the docs take him."

"I am so sorry, my friends. This is my fault. If I hadn't chosen to return to Midgard where I did, Bucky would have never been in peril." Thor lets Steve go, following guiltily as they go back inside. The sun's coming out. It seems so incredibly mundane.

It reminds Steve of the war. After Bucky fell, he kept expecting the world to be different, somehow, that there should be a tangible mark of his loss. He remembered knowing it was ridiculous, but still feeling betrayed that everything looked the same as before they left to capture the train.

It feels like that now, walking over the wet concrete in the post-rain haze of a perfectly ordinary morning. Bucky didn't die, but he almost did. Steve can't help thinking that there should be something to mark that, other than the agony of relief in his chest and the rippling under his skin that's like he's trembling but not.

"It's no one's fault, Thor," Steve says. It's like he's speaking by rote, saying what he knows Captain America would, but part of him isn't even paying attention. He almost doesn't pick up his shield, because he forgot for a moment that it belonged to him. "Bucky shouldn't've been there. But he's really sick. He didn't know what he was doing."

And he fell, again. He fell and Steve had him, and he still couldn't save him.

Tony nods. "Even the Hulk said he felt too hot." He snags his helmet as they pass by but doesn't put it on. He runs his fingers through his hair. "Fuck. I'm still shaking. I almost dove right into the fucking ground, trying to catch him. I can't believe I designed this tower and I never even _thought_ about…about what could happen on the roof. There's plenty of space under the platform for a net or something. God, I'm an idiot."

"No one expected this to happen," Steve says.

"No one ever does."

They finally get inside. 

"J.A.R.V.I.S., no one accesses the roof without authorization from me, Pepper or Steve Rogers," Tony says. "And, God. Bucky Barnes isn't allowed to access _anything_ without another Avenger present. Or Pepper. Do you understand, J? Not even a fucking coffee maker without adult-fucking-supervision. And I'm redoing your security protocols from the ground up, too. We're not doing this clusterfuck orgy again."

"Yes, sir," J.A.R.V.I.S. says. He sounds ashamed.

"We have to fix this, Tony," Steve says.

"No shit, we have to fix this." Tony looks up at Thor, walking in unhappy silence beside them. "Please, please tell us we can, big guy. I could really use some good news right about now."

"Alas, I have none."

"Good thing I didn't get my hopes up," Tony says.

* * *

"Holy fuck that's loud," Skye says. She was dreaming about being on the Bus, trying to run away from Ward when everywhere she needed to get to somehow meant climbing up crooked wooden ladders. She'd just gotten to the part where she realized she forgot her badge somewhere when the alarms work her. And though she's truly relieved she doesn't have to climb down all those ladders to get her badge, her nightmare was scary enough without the added wake-up-yelling surge of adrenaline.

"J, what's happening?" She scrambles out of her ridiculously luxurious bed and yanks off her jammies so she can yank on the bare minimum (jeans; sports bra; top) that she was wearing…jeeze. Just, like, a couple hours ago.

"The tower has been infiltrated," J.A.R.V.I.S. says. The fact that the A.I. doesn't sound entirely calm about this isn't doing anything good for the gallons of adrenaline the alarms already pumped into her bloodstream, but at least Skye is very, very awake.

"That's bad," she says, and decides to put on her socks and boots instead of staying barefoot. "Who is it? Where are they? Hey, how'd they get in? Can I help?" She can't help thinking of Stark as she snatches up her hair into a ponytail. Jemma also has long hair. She'd probably love to make some kind of superhero-gadget scrunchie with Leo to…

Never mind.

"Please stand by, Agent Skye," J.A.R.V.I.S. says. And seriously, Skye would've figured Stark's A.I. BFF would be better at multi-tasking. But hey, maybe he's just really busy doing a _Resident Evil_ Red Queen thing on the bad guys' asses.

Since J.A.R.V.I.S. isn't answering and she's not about to go rushing out there when she doesn't know what the situation is, Skye grabs the beautiful, beautiful Stark laptop she was given as a 'welcome to the tower' present and logs in. She may have spent an hour or so worming her way into some of the tower's monitoring systems instead of sleeping after the Wardraid this morning. Possibly.

And if that lets her find out which guys need an Avengers beat-down, all the better.

It's a little hard to concentrate with the alarm still screeching in her ears, but it's still easy enough to accesses the security feed. Skye starts flipping through the cameras, one after another. She can see Natasha and Bruce and Steve on the stairwell. Steve's in what looks like dorm pants and a tee-shirt, with his shield on his arm. But he's going up instead of down, unlike the other two. That's weird, especially since he's definitely already been in a fight. He's limping a little and there's blood on his head.

The cameras on the residence floors are too hackproof for her to bother with, but even when she checks out the stairwell and elevator landing where Steve and Bucky live, there's no trace of any centipedes or Hydra agents or Adgardian felons or anything. "Was Steve attacked, J? What happened?" She starts searching through all the cameras everywhere in the building before the A.I. answers, but just like with Steve's floor, there's no sign of anyone who shouldn't be there. And who would be able to beat Steve up, anyway? Other than Ward. And he's…

"Uh oh." Skye switches to the feed from the Hulk's room, which is where A.C. said they were going to keep Ward until they figured out what to do with him. Maybe he got out and tried to finish what he started with Captain America up-close and personal.

The Hulk room is actually almost an entire floor just like the residences, only it's all one very large space. One very large, softly-colored and sparsely-furnished space with not much in it, other than big, indestructible cushiony things and Hulky versions of children's toys. The giant, round-cornered building blocks look pretty fun.

It takes a moment to find Ward, but he's still there. He's in the farthest corner from the large, locked door, sitting with his back to the wall and kind of hugging himself behind his drawn up knees. Skye fumbles around a little until she figures out how to get a close up.

Ward's face is blank, but he's crying. The tears are running completely unchecked down his face, like he doesn't even know they're there.

Skye puts her hand over her mouth, watching Ward. He doesn't even move, just stares vacantly at the door like he's waiting for someone to come in. He looks nothing at all like the man who kissed her and told her that he wasn't a good person, or the man who sneered at her behind the barrel of a gun. Right now, Ward looks like a terrified child who's learned not to show it.

The alarm shuts off. Skye had gotten so used to it that for a second she doesn't realize it's missing. On the laptop screen, Ward blinks, then swallows and curls in a little tighter to himself.

Skye slaps the laptop closed and rushes out the door of the guest suite, only hesitating long enough to snatch up the little earbud radio she'd been given before the mission. She shoves it into her ear, just in case.

She expects J.A.R.V.I.S. to stop her before she gets to the stairwell, but he doesn't. She's two floors down when Tony Stark himself announces that it's a false alarm.

That explains why she didn't see anybody, but not who the hell kicked Captain America to the curb, or why he was rushing up to the roof.

"Hey, guys," Tony starts talking in her ear while Skye's trying to figure out who to ask about who beat on Steve Rogers. "I'll cut to the chase: Bucky's sick. He made the false alarm so he could…damn it."

She hears a click as Tony switches channels, and then nothing but static. Obviously non-Avengers weren't meant to hear that. Skye didn't think super soldier types could get sick. Whatever it is, it sounds really bad.

Skye exits the stairwell outside the Hulk room. There's a kind of anti-room that J.A.R.V.I.S. lets her into, but the door to the suite itself has a lock with a number code she doesn't know and knows better than to try and hack. But the entire wall is transparent so she can at least see everything, and there's an intercom so she and Ward can hear each other. 

She doesn't know if he'll talk, but he might listen.

Right now, it doesn't matter what he's done. After finding him in the power plant, Skye doesn't think that man exists anymore. And no one should look that hopeless and afraid.

"Hey, Grant," she says into comm. "I'm one of the women you saved in the power plant a few nights ago. My name is Skye, and I wanted to make sure you were all right."

He startles when he hears her voice, leaping straight up to his feet so that he's standing in the corner. He looks like he's prepared to fight for his life. Skye can hear the quickening rasp of his breathing over the comm. He's only wearing drawstring scrub-type pants, so she can see the dark silver of his arms and how the housing curves over where his shoulder would be, almost to the collarbones. His arms and hands and what she can see of his feet are made of interlocking pieces of metal. They're beautifully articulated, so perfectly like the human versions that the fact they're so obviously _not_ makes them that much more horrifying. The red Hydra emblem stands out like a bloodstain on each of his shoulders.

"Hey, hey, it's all right," she says gently. Then she tries not to wince when he focusses all his attention on her. She's really glad she didn't rush down here in bare feet and jammies. "You're safe. No one's going to hurt you." She wishes she could promise him that, but at least it's true for right now. "It was a false alarm. No one's come into the building."

He keeps staring at her, unmoving. He doesn't wipe his eyes.

"Um." Skye puts her hands on the door, wishing she could go into the room. But even if J.A.R.V.I.S. would somehow allow it she doesn't trust that Ward wouldn't attack her. "Could you come closer, please? It'll make it easier to talk to you."

He still doesn't move. "I don't know you."

Skye blinks at him in surprise. "Yeah, but…you remember me, right? From the power plant? You saved our lives," she adds more softly when it's obvious he has no idea what she's talking about. "You really don't remember?"

He shakes his head. "Are you going to take me?"

Not 'rescue', she notes. Not 'save'. 'Take'. Like whatever she's here for can't be good. But he doesn't remember her, so how would he know?

"Did…did they wipe you again? When they took you back?"

He doesn't answer that, which she figures is answer enough. "Are you here to take me?"

Skye shakes her head. "No. You're staying here. You're safe. No one's going to hurt you or take you anywhere."

He doesn't answer.

"Okay, this is getting creepy and awkward." Skye purses her lips, tries again. "I came here because I saw on the monitors that you were crying. Are you all right?"

His eyes widen in obvious alarm, and now he hurriedly swipes the wetness from his face. He stands straight with his hands behind his back, looking as battle-ready as humanly possible wearing scrubs and without a shirt or shoes.

"I'm fine," he says. 

Skye's about to snap, 'no you're not', but she just takes a breath instead. "Why were you crying?" 

His eyes dart and she can see him swallow. She's almost certain he won't answer, but he says, "I failed to protect Agent Taylor. Iron Man killed her."

"Is that why you're sad?" Skye asks. She doesn't like this feeling that she's talking to a child, but Ward seems as vulnerable as one. A killer-baby. It's tragic and insane.

He nods. "She's gone. I don't…I don't what to do anymore." His gaze sharpens on her. "Are you here to terminate me?"

"No!" Skye says, so loud in her shock that Ward flinches. "No." She shakes her head vehemently enough to make her ponytail swing. "No one's going to hurt you, Grant. We want to help."

If anything he just looks bewildered. "Are you going to retrain me?"

Skye rubs her face. "Could you please come closer, Grant? I really would like to have this conversation face-to-face."

He hesitates, but slowly walks to the clear entranceway separating them.

"Hi." She smiles as warmly as she can. "This isn't Hydra, Grant. We don't want to retrain you or torture you or—or _kill_ you or replace any other parts of your body. We want to help you be…to be all right. To have your memories back."

And now he looks absolutely terror-struck, like offering to help him is worse than killing him. "Please, don't do that. I don't want them."

"Whoa." Skye blinks. "Why not? Don't you want to know who you are?"

He starts shaking, hands in trembling fists as if he's trying to hold himself together. "I know. I know what I am. It hurts."

"Wait." Skye holds up her hand. "What do you mean? What hurts? Being what you are? Oh, no," she breathes. "You mean, your arms and legs? Do they hurt?"

"No." He shakes his head, only barely calmer now. He's still trembling. "No. Remembering. Remembering hurts."

"Oh, God." Skye puts her hand over her mouth, just staring at him. She has to clear her throat a couple times before she can speak. "Why does remembering hurt, Grant?"

"I'm a monster."

Skye's so astonished at his words that she recoils. Her first instinct is to tell him it's not true, but she remembers how he'd said the same thing about himself back in the abandoned power plant. And how Jemma had agreed and Skye hadn't contradicted either of them. "What do you remember?"

"I-I think…there was a girl." he says, looking at her as if she could confirm it. "She's dead. I shot her." He swallows heavily. "And a boy. Drowning. I don't know why it's happening, but…but it's my fault." He puts his metal hands on the glass and leans against it like he's in pain. Skye puts her palms over his without even thinking about it. "They were begging me, not to let them go," he says, very softly. "But I did." He looks up at her again, eyes huge and frightened and imploring. "Why did I do that? Why did I drop them in the water?"

Skye gasps, steps back from him as if the glass is about to break. "You mean FitzSimmons," she says. "Leo Fitz and Jemma Simmons," she corrects herself when he just stares at her. "They're…they were your friends."

He blinks and more tears roll down his face, but he ignores them the way he did the earlier ones. "Why did I drop them in the water?"

"I don't know," Skye says, but that's not true. She does know. She just never understood it until Tony explained why. "Because a monster told you to."

She can't tell if that makes any more sense to him than it had to her. "Did they die?"

Skye shakes her head. "They're both alive. But Leo…he might never wake up."

Ward's eyes are bleak and so terribly sad. "I'm sorry." 

"What?" Skye heard the words—of course she heard them, he's right in front of her—but hearing him apologize like he actually means it…

There a tremendous crash somewhere above them. Skye cries out and flinches. Ward whirls to face the direction they heard the threat coming from.

"J.A.R.V.I.S., what the hell was that?"

"That was the Hulk. But please don't be alarmed, Agent Skye. No one in the tower is in jeopardy." The A.I. sounds about as jubilant as Skye's ever heard him.

"Okay. Thanks," she says, hoping A.C. will fill her in later. Skye turns back to Ward. "At least that's…what's wrong?"

"I don't know." Ward's leaning against the glass, looking confused with his hand over his chest. He winces, takes a breath that hitches in and out. "My lungs—"

He looks startled, and then he just drops. Straight down onto his right side. He rolls onto his back, both hands over his chest and eyes wide open in shock and fear.

His chest isn't moving. He looks like he did on the Bus when Mike stopped his heart. But there's no one here to bargain with. No one here but her. And he's dying.

"Grant? Grant! Grant!" Skye falls to her knees, bending so close to him that she bangs her nose. "Grant! J.A.R.V.I.S., get the doctors! He's hurt. He's not breathing. Oh God, oh my God." She rockets up, hands hovering desperately over the keypad for the door. "Let me in. He needs help. Please let me in."

"I'm sorry, Agent Skye, but I have strict instructions—"

"J.A.R.V.I.S., he's _dying!_ He needs CPR. Let me in!"

The doors slide open.

The A.I. says something about the docs being alerted and Grant having no vital signs, but Skye ignores it. She puts her hands on his chest and starts compressions, counting out 30. Then she tilts his head back and gives him air, then goes back to the compressions. Over and over again.

But he never gets his pulse back, and he never starts breathing.


	8. Chapter 8

"Okay. Do you want the bad news, or the worse news?" Dr. Massi looks levelly at the small group gathered in her office. Her eyes are sympathetic behind her glasses, despite how tired Tony knows she must be. Not as tired as him, but her shift ended hours ago. She stayed to help Dr. Zaccaro keep Ward and Bucky alive.

"Which news is about Grant?" Skye asks. She looks very tired and young, with her stupid scrunchie and her big doe eyes. Jemma's standing next to her, so tiny and bed-mussed that Tony just wants to scoop her up and give her a Captain Bearmerica and tuck her back into bed.

They're holding hands. Seriously, it's like a basket of sad kittens.

Coulson is standing just behind them with one hand on each of their shoulders like he's their dad. He's only wearing part of his suit, without the tie or the jacket. For him that's disheveled.

"Grant Ward is the worse news," Massi says gently, and that's one of the things Tony loves about her: she's great at softly bringing the hammer down. She glances at her Starktab, then looks back up at the five of them. "Ward has no medical proxy, but Sergeant Barnes does. I want to make sure you're all right with other people hearing his diagnosis, Captain Rogers."

She eyes Tony, because she knows there's no reason for him to be there.

Tony knows it too, but he doesn't care. He cares about Bucky, a lot. But he's here for James. Because if Bucky dies, James does too. And there's no way in hell Tony's going to worry about medical proxies when his kid's life is on the line.

Skye raises one of her hands. "I just want to know about Grant. No offence."

Jemma nods in agreement.

"None taken," Steve says. He gives them a facsimile of one of his public smiles, which might look better if he weren't still healing from the beating he took from the Asset. He's standing stiff with pain and so pale he's almost the same color as his generic white tee-shirt. There's a dark purple bruise on his temple that makes Tony wince just to look at it. His hair is drying in little baby-chick tufts from the rain.

Steve should actually be in an actual bed, not standing in Massi's office, but even the doc knows better than to suggest it.

Tony is in bare feet, jeans that are perma-stained from the workshop, and the first shirt he found in the drawer, which has the Hulk on it. Then again, he's so tired they're probably lucky he's not naked.

"Go ahead and tell us about Ward first," Steve says to Massi.

Tony wants to hear about Ward too. He told Coulson Ward was worth saving and he really believes that. But Tony wants to hear about Bucky more. Naturally, however, Steve is a shining-fucking-pillar-of-fucking-virtue and is far too polite to _God forbid_ make the baby Agents wait another five fucking minutes to hear the prognosis for their homicidal ex-teammate.

"All right." Massi nods and shoves her glasses back up her nose. "As you probably guessed, the loud noise had nothing to do with Ward's collapse. He'd been implanted with a near-microscopic device with the specific purpose of stopping his heart and lungs, probably within a window of five or six hours after it was triggered."

"Where?" Coulson asks. "You said his MRI came back clean." He looks at Tony, who nods, just as blindsided.

"I know," Massi agrees grimly. "It was attached to the Atlas vertebra."

"That's the one right under the skull," Jemma leaps in. "Sorry," she mumbles at Massi's mild look.

"Right beneath the skull, yes," the doctor continues without missing a beat. "His spine has been entirely reinforced with adamantium. That, along with the circuitry, made even seeing something that small and also made of metal almost impossible, let alone to recognize it as something with a unique function." She takes off her glasses and rubs the bridge of her nose. "Which doesn't excuse us missing it."

"Not your fault," Coulson says, smiling in that taut, professional way of his. "Hydra is very good at hiding in plain sight."

"And murdering people in cold blood," Steve adds.

Massi nods, then sighs and slides her glasses back on, then pulls her long hair behind her shoulder. "In any case, despite Agent Skye's administration of CPR—you did well, by the way," she says to Skye, who barely bobs her head to acknowledge the compliment. "Ward's brain suffered global anoxia. He has severe brain damage, but we won't know the full extent until we've done some testing. But right now he's completely unresponsive to outside stimuli, and incapable of breathing on his own. As far as we can tell, he has minimal brain function."

"Like Leo," Jemma says. "That's horribly ironic." She puts her fingers over his lips, eyes widening as if she just realized she said it out loud.

"So he's brain dead," Tony says. He glances at Coulson again. This pretty much solves the Ward problem, in a grotesque, soul-in-limbo kind of way. But Coulson doesn't look relieved. He looks pissed. Pissed and unhappy. He hides it well, but Tony knows Agent well enough that he can see it in the press of his lips.

None of them wanted this to happen.

"Brain dead?" Skye repeats. She looks like Tony's just slapped her. Tony feels bad about that. He's fairly sure he'd be less blunt if he wasn't so tired, but he's just about swaying on his feet after three days without sleeping. He's gone longer than this, though not since the Battle of New York and the subsequent self-medicating via suit frenzy.

Sadly, the last three nights haven't been nearly as productive as those other ones were, but he's pretty sure he's not going to sleep tonight either. Not with this unending fucking-disaster party with Bucky as the guest of honor.

(And it has nothing to do with how he keeps seeing Bucky falling, just out of reach, every time Tony closes his eyes.)

"Right now we'd say he's in a persistent vegetative state, not brain-dead," Massi says, as if a label that conjures up images of rotting cauliflower is somehow better. "He shows some movement and occasionally opens his eyes. But again, we'll need to run tests before we can make any official diagnosis."

"Will he be able to heal?" Skye asks, small-voiced.

"Maybe?" Massi adjusts her glasses, looking at her Starktab instead of Skye's big, anguished eyes. "Sergeant Barnes was able to heal from the damage done to portions of his brain, but Anoxia causes cell death everywhere in the brain due to lack of oxygen. Ward has far more extensive brain damage than Bucky experienced." She spreads her hands. "And frankly, right now he's deteriorating. Again, we'll run tests to be sure, but…" She winces. "I don't see him coming out of this. I'm sorry."

Tony can't tell what Jemma's thinking about this, but Skye for sure looks like she's trying not to start crying.

"All right." Tony lets out a heavy breath as he runs his fingers through his hair. He looks up through his lashes at Steve, who's being polite and quiet and so tense he looks like he'll go off like a grenade if Tony so much as pokes him. "So, Ward is completely FUBAR. What about Bucky?"

"'I think that's our cue to leave," Coulson says to the two agents. "Thank you," he says to Massi.

Jemma just nods and sort of smiles.

"Yeah, thanks," Skye says. She wipes her eyes. "Can I see him?"

"Yes, certainly," the doctor says. "But please remember that even if it seems like he's reacting to you, he isn't. He's not capable of it."

Skye swallows, but nods. "I'll remember."

Massi waits until Coulson leads the two agent-babies out of her office, then she eyes Tony again. "Are you sure you want Mr. Stark here for this, Captain?"

"Yes I do," Steve says, with so much certainty that Tony stares at him. Steve glances at Tony with an expression that's almost close to a smile. "He's here because he wants to help, and I trust him."

"Oh. Thanks," Tony says, taken aback. "And, um, you're right. I do. I do want to help."

"All right then." Massi clears her throat. "Sergeant Barnes is the bad news. We did an MRI, X-ray, tested for allergies, viruses, bacteria, mold, parasites…there's nothing wrong with him."

"His metal arm mimics his body temperature. It was _steaming_ ," Steve says. Not rudely, of course, but stridently enough to make the doctor blink at him. "And his nose keeps bleeding."

"Not to mention the killer headache he's been rocking since the fight with Ward," Tony adds.

Steve nods. "How can he be experiencing all that without anything being wrong?"

"Have you heard of psychosomatic illness?"

"No," Steve says.

Tony raises his hand. "I was diagnosed with it. Once. Sometime. For some reason. Basically it means it's all in Bucky's head." He winces. "Jeeze. Literally."

Steve's jaw tightens. "Bucky's not making this up."

Massi shakes her head quickly. "No one is saying that, Captain. Sergeant Barnes' distress and his symptoms are very real. It's just that, in this case, his physical symptoms appear to be a manifestation of his emotional stress."

"Like, he's got a battle royale going on in his head, so he gets an actual headache," Tony says.

"And fever and hemorrhaging," Massi confirms. She looks at Steve. "And in this case his healing ability can't help, because there's no injury or illness to heal."

"You mean, unless we solve the underlying problem, this isn't going to go away," Steve says.

"Yes, exactly," Massi says. "We're giving him high doses of antipyretics—sorry, anti-fever medication—and painkillers for his discomfort. And we're keeping him cool. But other than that…" She grimaces in obvious helpless frustration. "That's all we can do. The rest is up to him."

"Is he going to die?" Steve asks, and there's something about his voice that makes Tony stare at him.

It's too calm. It's too calm, like his last radio communication before he crashed the _Valkyrie_. Tony had to listen to it enough times growing up that he remembers it. _This is my choice._ That's the voice of someone who knows he's hit the end of the line, and the only thing waiting is the oncoming train.

Maybe Massi hears it too, because the look she gives Steve is way more 'deer in headlights' than 'genius medical professional'. "Yes," she says finally, after a silence that feels like you could run a naval convoy through it. "If we can't get his body to stop fighting itself, eventually it will kill him.

"I'm sorry," she says, because Steve isn't saying anything.

"I know you're doing your best," Steve says thickly.

"We are," Massi says. "I'm worried it won't be enough, but we're doing everything we can. If we can't keep his fever down this way, the other option will be a medical coma. Like shutting everything down for a reboot." She quirks a tiny corner of a smile at her own analogy.

"That's…you can do that?" Steve asks.

"Oh yes, absolutely," Massi says with gratifying ease. "And if that doesn't work, my colleague Dr. Zaccaro wants to look into cryostasis—"

"No," Steve cuts her off. His eyes are like blue stones, but Tony didn't miss the flash of horror in them. "No. Bucky can't…I won't let that happen to him again."

It's obvious Massi doesn't want to hear that, but she nods. "Of course. We'll respect your decision."

"Yes you will," Steve says. It's a statement of fact, not a threat, but Tony can't help the shiver that goes down his spine. This, he thinks, is the same guy who rescued over 400 men single-handedly during the war; the same guy who coordinated the implosion of S.H.I.E.L.D. This is not somebody you fuck with.

Bucky is not going into cryostasis.

Tony just hopes that's not a decision Steve will end up regretting.

* * *

"Hey, Bucky, how are you, pal?"

Tony stands back politely and listens to Steve and doesn't say the 'he's really lousy, actually' out loud, despite how Steve has to know that's the only reasonable answer.

Then again, maybe 'really lousy' isn't the most reasonable answer. Because actually, Bucky looks like the most reasonable answer should be, 'like absolute and total fucking hell.'

But, "Not too bad. Been better," Bucky says, with a weak version of his usual shit-eating grin. Of course he says that, because if you're not going to lie to your loved ones about how close to Death's door you are, who are you going to lie to?

Bucky looks distressingly close to Death's door. In fact, he looks like Death invited him in and they're sitting on Death's couch drinking Death's beer and playing _Super Mario Kart_ on Death's game console. His skin is whitish-grey, as if he's been coated with plaster. He's under a cooling gel blanket and surrounded by ice packs, and even then, when Tony slides his fingers underneath the plastic to touch his left arm, he can feel the heat radiating off him. It's like Arizona wearing the Arctic. Tony's not sure why Bucky's even coherent, burning up like this. His eyes are like cloudy blue marbles sunk in stone.

Even Bucky's hair seems washed out, sweat-salted as it is. The only other color on him that seems real comes from the twin spots of red ringing each nostril.

Steve smiles like he's pretending to accept Bucky's bullshit. He's holding Bucky's right hand, which is both attached to the bedrail and hidden under the gel blanket, just like his left one. His ankles are too. Bucky's either too sick to notice he's trussed up like hospital porn or too sick to care. "Tony and I came by to tell you that we're working on a way to fix this. You're going to be just fine."

Bucky snorts, which causes a small spatter of blood on the lower half of his face. "You mean, all of us?" he asks, then grimaces when he can't wipe the blood away. Tony's closer to the tissues so he does it for him, thinking of James.

It's kind of stupid how much Tony misses him.

"Yeah, we do mean all of you," Tony says. He shoves his hands in his pockets so he won't do something creepily parental like push Bucky's hair off his forehead. "That's the idea—to help you get the band back together so you'll stop overheating."

Bucky turns his head enough to pin Tony with his glassy eyeballs. "I told you, it's not gonna work." He closes his eyes and lets his head thump back on the pillow. Tony hates that he can recognize that combination of frustration and despair. "I ain't going anywhere unless the fucking Asset's dead and buried. And James…" he swallows. "He can't."

"We're going to figure something out, Bucky," Steve says, with that earnestness you can't help but believe. "I promise. Don't give up hope."

Bucky's laugh is a dry rattle, and he doesn't open his eyes. "I gave up hoping a long fucking time ago, Stevie. 'Bout the same time I fell outta the damn train."

Steve looks like he's been gutted for a second. "You didn't give up when you were on the roof, Bucky," he says, voice rough.

Bucky opens his eyes, looking at Steve with a kind of bleary anger. "You don't even know who you're talking to, do you? Bucky was gonna jump. It was all I could do to stop him."

"I know, Sergeant," Steve says, so straightforward that Tony believes that too. Steve smiles, one of his rare real ones. "I know exactly who you are. And I know exactly what you did up there: you kept him from letting go long enough for us to help you."

Barnes—Bucky—looks like he's not feeling well enough to figure out if he's being patronized or not. He licks his lips, a flash of pink sandpaper on gypsum. "He doesn't…Bucky doesn't really want to die. He's just so fucking tired."

Steve nods. "I know," he says, but Tony can see the relief he's pretending not to feel. "I can't even imagine what it must be like, trying to keep control when there are people fighting you for your own body all the time. But you can't give up, Bucky. You can't give up, and you can't lose hope, all right? We'll figure this out."

Bucky nods distantly. "Yeah. Okay."

He closes his eyes and the silence stretches. Tony can't tell if Bucky's fallen asleep, but when Bucky's forehead wrinkles Tony automatically pushes his hair back. He realizes what he's doing and freezes, glancing guiltily at Steve. But Steve just smiles.

"I'm sorry," Bucky says all at once.

It's so unexpected that for a second Tony thinks he's somehow apologizing for Tony touching him.

Steve frowns in confusion. "What for?"

"For not being Bucky. The one you wanted." Bucky blinks, and tears roll out of the corners of his shadowed eyes. "I tried to be. I know I got angry a lot. Didn't…talk as much, like Bucky did. But I had to protect you, you know? I had to pay attention, 'cause you were too busy leading to take care of yourself. I couldn't…I couldn't let what Zola did to me happen to you, Stevie. I swore I'd die before I let that happen to you."

"Bucky," Steve says. He lets go of Bucky's hand and cups the side of his face. "I'm sorry about what I said before. I'm so sorry. It was just…your shoulder was so badly cut, and I didn't understand what had happened. Nothing except how close I came to losing you again. But I understand now, and I know who you are. You've always been Bucky. You were when you refused to leave the burning factory without me, and you were when we were kicking Nazi ass all over Europe,"—that gets a thin smile—"and you were when…" Steve swallows. "When you fell. You've always been Bucky. Just like I've always been Steve."

Bucky's eyes are barely open, and his smirk is like a hot, dry ghost, but it's there. "Little guy from Brooklyn who was too dumb not to run away from a fight."

Steve grins back, and it's about as wet as Bucky's is dry. "Yeah, Buck. But you're not following anyone into the jaws of Death, all right? You need to hang on so we can fix this."

"Sure," Bucky says, on a sigh like steam. He closes his eyes. "M'just tired."

"I'm sure you must be," Steve says. He swallows, cards his fingers through Bucky's hair. "You get some sleep, okay, buddy? We'll be back soon."

"Okay." The word barely has air to shape it. Bucky turns his head, looking like he wants to roll up onto his side. "Just, close the window, will ya? I'm freezing in here. You're gonna get pneumonia or something."

Steve blinks. "Bucky?" He rubs Bucky's cheek gently with his thumb. "Bucky? Can you hear me? Bucky?"

Bucky's eyes crack to pale blue slits. "Lemme sleep."

"Yeah, sure," Steve says. He shoots a worried glance at Tony, who nods. Bucky shouldn't feel cold, with the heat he's still putting out.

"Be right back," Tony says, and goes to get the doctor, hoping there's something she can do.

* * *

Steve's pacing outside the medical suite. Behind the large, pristine glass sliding doors, Dr. Zaccaro and the nurses are trying to lower Bucky's fever. Steve has no idea when the medical shift changed, but at some point it became late morning and Massi finally left. He hasn't eaten anything since before the raid on the Hydra facility; hasn't slept. He's hungry and tired and aching from far more than his injuries, but he's not going to go any farther away than the waiting area outside the doors. Not until he finds out how Bucky is. He would still be at Bucky's side if the doctor hadn't said he was in the way.

All he knows for sure is that the fever isn't going down.

"Steve?"

"What?" Steve stops and turns to face Tony, managing to bite back the snap in his tone before he finishes the word. None of this is Tony's fault. Steve rubs his palm over his face, makes himself take a few deep breaths until he has his temper under control. "Just…just tell me you can do this, Tony. That what I said to Bucky wasn't a lie. Please, tell me you've got something that means Bucky's not…" He swallows. "He can't die, Tony," he says, and his voice shakes. "Please tell me you can fix him so he's not going to die."

Tony looks poleaxed, standing stalk-still with his dark eyes huge and blank with shock. He licks his lips, opens his mouth slowly like he's still trying to figure out what to say. Steve knows how unfair it was of him to put this kind of pressure on his friend like this, but he's too desperate to care. He stopped scaring himself with how far he'd go to make sure Bucky was all right a long time ago. Just this morning he would've gladly followed him into the ground.

"I can't," Tony says. He still looks shocked, as if he can't believe his own words. "I'm sorry. I can't…Pepper told me that she had something, she and Bruce. But right now, I don't have anything. I haven't had time."

"Oh," Steve says, very quietly. It only makes sense, but he can't stop the wave of stunned disappointment he feels, like Tony's betrayed him. He wants to say something like, 'I know you will', or 'you won't let me down', but he can't. It's all he can do not to let what he's feeling show on his face.

"I'm sorry," Tony says again, because he can probably see exactly how Steve feels anyway.

Steve nods. "Not your fault." His throat hurts.

"I've been working on it though," Tony says quickly, as if he's worried that Steve will think he doesn't care. "And I think the only viable solution is to extract James. Sergeant Barnes told me that he wants to reintegrate, but we know he won't unless the Asset's gone. And James can't, because he's the one who gets hurt. Which is pretty fucking terrible job security, if you ask me. But it kept him alive, so—"

"Tony," Steve says.

"Right. Sorry." Tony clears his throat. "But, Barnes told me that if James and the Asset weren't there anymore, he, Bucky and Vanya could integrate. They'd stop fighting."

Steve remembers the Avengers' first meeting about this, after Bucky tried to cut off his left arm. Tony's idea to remove Barnes and the Asset had seemed like a good one, until Clint had wondered if taking Barnes away might take what was essential to Bucky as well. Then Natasha had made the same suggestion about the Asset. "You're talking about…removing James?" Steve stares at Tony. "That would kill him."

Tony shakes his head. "Not if we…wait. Who would be killed? James or Bucky?"

"James," Steve says, then hesitates. "Or, both of them."

Tony just shakes his head again. "No. No, it wouldn't. Hear me out." He raises his hand before Steve can do more than open his mouth. "Sergeant Barnes is practically Bucky—we agreed on that. Hell, Barnes has said as much. And from what James said, the Asset was a quick and dirty torture sink he made so Bucky could survive what Hydra did to him. But James is like Vanya or Bucky. They're the honchos, remember? That's because they're all complete personalities."

Steve nods. "James acts like a separate person."

"He is a separate person," Tony says with authority. "Believe me. He's a real boy. Hell, he's even more stubborn than your boyfriend," It sparks an uncomfortable flare of jealousy, that Tony might know any facet of Bucky better than Steve does, but Steve ignores it. "But the point is," Tony continues, "if we can remove James, it wouldn't hurt him or Bucky. And I'm pretty sure that if he goes, he'll take the Asset with him."

"How?" Steve bites back the shout of frustration. "How? You just said you can't fix this."

"Yeah," Tony agrees on a miserable huff of air. "Yeah. That's the big fucking problem. I mean, I'm a fucking _ace_ at electronics. Hardware, software, doesn't matter. But bio?" He shakes his head. "No clue. I have seriously no fucking clue."

"Would Bruce?" Steve asks, desperately latching onto what Tony said before.

"Maybe?" Tony says. "Pepper said they'd found something, but she refused to tell me until I got some sleep. And then this happened."

"All right." Steve feels a flicker of hope. Maybe Pepper found something good. Maybe they really do have something. Maybe Steve didn't lie to Bucky after all. "We'll have to ask Bruce and Pepper, then. After…" He can't help glancing back at the medical suite. No one's come out yet. He doesn't know if that's a good or a bad sign.

"Steve?" Tony says, and something in his voice makes Steve focus his attention back on him.

"Yeah?"

"Um." Tony shifts, looking uncharacteristically nervous. He crosses his arms like he's expecting a fight. "Look. I don't even know if we can do this, if there's any way it can work at all. But if we can somehow…extract James from Bucky, and, I don't know. Make him a body somehow. Maybe a Life Model Decoy or…I don't know." He takes a breath. "But, I want him. I mean, I want to adopt him. Pepper and me. We want James to be our son."

For a moment all Steve can do is stare at him. "You want to adopt James?" The flare of jealousy—no, _possessiveness_ —that engulfs him this time nearly steals his breath. James is part of Bucky, and Bucky belongs with Steve.

But James wouldn't be part of Bucky. Not in the scenario Tony's envisioned. James would be a separate person. A real boy, like Tony said. A child who would need parents.

"Are you asking my permission?"

"No," Tony says, though he still looks anxious. "I already got Bucky's. Sergeant Barnes said he'd be cool with James being out of his head as long as he was somewhere safe and happy. And Pepper and I…we can do that. I mean, I know I'm no one's idea of a good parent," he goes on quickly, as if wants to say it before Steve does. "But I would be. At least, I'd try like hell, you know? For him. I'd…" He lifts the edges of his mouth in an awfully self-conscious smile. "I'd pretty much do anything for him. Which I know is insane, since I only even met James, like, two days ago? Something. But, yeah." Tony shrugs. "Yeah. I would. It's like, it's like he's already mine."

"Bucky tends to have that effect on people," Steve says, and Tony smirks. But Steve understands what Tony's really asking for now. It's not permission; he wants Steve's blessing.

It's humbling and a little sad, so Steve says the first thing he can think of, which is true anyway. "I trust you, Tony. You and Pepper. I know you'll do a great job."

And despite everything, Tony grins like Steve just gave him the best compliment he could ever hope for.

But that still doesn't change how there may be no way to give James any kind of future, or Bucky either. And Steve can see Dr. Zaccaro coming over Tony's shoulder, and even before the doors slide open he knows by her face that she's not going to say anything good.

* * *

"No," Tony says to Pepper as soon as he enters their living room. "Steve's watching Bucky being put into a fucking artificial _coma_ right now, and I am not waiting another eight hours to find out what the hell you and Bruce figured out. Either you tell me or I'll just find it myself, but I'm not sleeping when Bucky is fucking _boiling to death_ in his own body."

Pepper stares at him. "I was actually going to say that Bruce will be here any minute."

Tony opens his mouth, shuts it. "Oh." He should've figured that she'd be on the same page, but he didn't realize how much the righteous fury was sustaining him until he suddenly doesn't need it anymore. The exhaustion kind of swoops in and almost knocks him off his feet. He sits down heavily next to Pepper, throwing his arm around her and being careful not to close his eyes. "Lay it on me, then."

She nods. "J.A.R.V.I.S., please show Tony what Bruce and I were looking at yesterday."

"Certainly, Ms. Potts," J.A.R.V.I.S. answers smoothly. Instantly the living room is turned into a series of stacked holographic screens. One of them has a picture of a wispy, wild-haired little man with glasses and a lab coat. He looks familiar, but that might just be the typical scientist getup. He's standing next to another lab-coated guy who looks like a bespectacled, bearded teddy bear. They're each grinning and holding something that looks like a quadruped toaster under one arm. Next to them both is a younger man in old-school camouflage with short, military-style hair and an expression of bemused tolerance. He's holding a little soccer ball.

Another has a very old photograph of an extremely good-looking guy in what Tony's pretty sure is a World War 1 uniform. That photo is captioned **ATA Acquisition Subject 1 - Captain James Shepherd**. And then next to it is a picture of what can only be the same guy, except this time it's in color and he's wearing modernish camo like the soldier with the soccer ball. Shepherd's smiling self-consciously, kind of looking off-camera as if he's waiting to be told he can leave. The caption for that picture reads: **Human-emulate Artificial Intelligence - SX-7 - 'Shep'**.

And then the third picture. It's the same ridiculously handsome, time-jumping military guy, looking even more self-conscious, if anything. He's not smiling at all this time, and his pose seems stiff enough for a military I.D. This picture is dated 2004 and captioned with, **Major John Sheppard, USAF**. 

"Okay," Tony says, speaking slowly partially because he's trying to give himself time to work out what the hell the significance is of what he's looking at. "I admit the flyboy's pretty hot, but I was hoping that Astro-Boying James up wouldn't be the only solution."

"That's, ah, that's not Astro Boy," Bruce says as he comes in. He stops for a moment and squints at the pictures like he's looking for something. "I mean, the point isn't really the robot."

Tony blinks at the pictures, then at Bruce as he walks through the screens. He's too tired for this shit. "Then what is the point?" he says on an angry sigh, pinching the bridge of his nose. "Time travel? Reincarnation? Cloning?" He stops, blinks, looks up. "Wait. Major Hotlips there—he's a clone of the World War I Shepherd?"

Bruce nods in that way he does when he's only reasonably certain of where Tony's brain is going. "Yes. He's a clone. But more importantly…" He moves the photo of 'Shep' so close to the one of Sheppard that their sculpted cheeks are almost touching. "The body's a clone of James Shepherd. But the mind comes from the artificial intelligence." Bruce taps the 'Shep' picture, making it ripple.

Tony's sitting up straight now, eyes wide as he takes the information in. He looks back at the pictures of the two lab coats and the random military dude. "J.A.R.V.I.S.," he says, "why is that little guy with glasses familiar?"

"His name is Doctor Radek Zelenka. Previously considered one of the world's foremost experts in physics and engineering after Doctor Rodney Meredith Ingram McKay, he—"

"Wait. Stop. McKay? Rodney McKay? That Canadian prick of a genius who more-or-less disappeared into the bowels of Stargate Command back in 2004? Exchanges emails with Foster on wormholes and crazy alternate-dimension shit? _That_ Rodney McKay?"

"Yes, sir. It is precisely that Rodney McKay." J.A.R.V.I.S. sounds a little peeved that Tony derailed his biographical recitation. "He works closely with Doctor Zelenka."

"And they're both experts in robotics," Pepper says. She scooches far enough away from Tony so that she can look at him. "Like you. Only I'd say from that,"—she gestures at the picture of 'Shep'—"that they have access to materials that you don't."

Tony stands up slowly, eyes on the picture. He nods. "Damn straight they do. J, help me out here, buddy. Things before 2008 are a little fuzzy, but wasn't Zelenka at a conference, somewhere, geekgasming over a bunch of teeny robots that looked like…mini tanks with light bulbs?" Tony knows he has a good memory, but sometimes everything before Afghanistan feels like nothing but a long, bleary string of fratboy-type parties and hangovers.

J.A.R.V.I.S. obligingly tosses up a couple pictures of the little guy with the hair, cooing over a plastic kiddie pool filled with a bunch of tank-treaded robots exactly like Tony remembers. He's holding one red and one blue one, each in a different hand, looking down in rapt glee at a yellow, green and orange one in the pool. The picture's large enough that on the lanyard around his neck, Tony can just make out Zelenka's name and then underneath it, _United States Air Force N.O.R.A.D. Deep Space Telemetry Division_. And of course— _of course_ , because it's like the fucking fixed point of his life—the pictures are from the Millennial Technology Summit in Bern, Switzerland, 1999.

"The N.O.R.A.D. thing's a front," Tony says, though he's sure that Bruce and Pepper already know that if they have these pictures. "J.A.R.V.I.S., what's Major Sheppard's service record?"

"He's now a Colonel, sir, though much of his record is classified." The A.I. obligingly lists it anyway, and just like Tony thought, the colonel works for N.O.R.A.D. as well. "Not sure what they'd need a Black Ops specialist doing deep space telemetry for," he murmurs, but what's more interesting is that Sheppard has a date and place of birth and even parents, though they're conveniently deceased.

"So he's a clone," Tony says. He shakes his head in grudging wonder. "I knew the SGC guys had access so some sweet alien tech, but this is like, total _Star Wars_ shit." He looks at the picture of Zelenka again. "Did I consult for this guy? I have a vague memory of strongly-worded emails."

"You did, sir. In 2001. You offered invaluable insight into expanding the experiential algorithms of the core processors he was working with at the time."

"I'm sure it was totally invaluable." Tony looks from Bruce to Pepper, not sure if he should be feeling excited about this or hopeful or anything. "Okay, so you're saying that Stargate Command, who kind-of, sort-of broke up with me when I stopped making weapons, can make clones of dead people and give them the personalities of…robots? And that's going to help Bucky how, exactly?"

"Oh, the SGC still has plenty of time for Stark Industries, Tony," Pepper says, coming to stand beside him. She gestures at all the pictures. "Stark Industries supplies components to Stargate Command all the time. That's why we have this information in the archives." She nods at the picture of 'Shep'. "We helped build him and his brother."

Tony blinks. "Brother?"

J.A.R.V.I.S. obligingly adds more pictures to the collection. This is another set of three nearly-identical, ridiculously hot men. Only the dead version is from more recently than the First World War. Vietnam era, most likely. His picture is labeled **ATA Acquisition Subject 2 - Captain Mitchell Cambron**. And underneath the robot is **Human-emulate Artificial Intelligence - SX-8 - 'Mitch'**. The final, human clone is Lieutenant Colonel Cameron Mitchell, also of the USAF. And N.O.R.A.D., naturally.

"Really creative with the names, aren't they?" Tony says, looking between 'Mitch' and 'Shep'. Both Mitch and the Cameron Mitchell the robot apparently became seem way more laidback than Shep or John Sheppard. In his military I.D. Cameron's about to crack a smile. He and John look about as related as Steve and Bucky.

"They were raised together," Pepper tells him, obviously noticing his disbelief. "The blue and red robots are Mitch and Shep as, well, babies."

"Babies," Tony repeats. "So the walking toasters are…"

Pepper nods. "Toddlers. And the human-emulates are the teenagers."

"And the dead-people clones are the adults," Tony finishes, eyes following the flyboys' natural history from Zelenka's tiny tanks to the runway models turned Air Force officers. "That's one hell of a science project."

"They needed carriers of a particular gene," Bruce says, answering Tony's unasked question. He gestures at the pictures. "Apparently all this was actually easier than isolating the gene and creating a therapy for it."

"They didn't have time to wait for the clones to grow naturally, so they made them as adults," Pepper says. "The artificial intelligences were to give the bodies adult skills and personalities, but in a much shorter timeframe. Five years instead of nearly twenty."

"Wow. That must be one fuck of an awesome gene," Tony says.

"The gene carriers can use a certain kind of alien technology. Tech that's at least as sophisticated as Asgard, as far as I could tell. And apparently there are places Stargate Command sends people regularly where it's necessary just for survival," Bruce says. "But they don't only make clones of, um, dead people. They have other ones. Other clones, I mean. Any viable cells will work."

"And think about it," Pepper says. She wraps both her hands around his arm, as if she has to make sure he's listening. "If they can make electronic data biological, why couldn't they just transfer biological data? It'd be easier, wouldn't it?"

"Wetware isn't really my style." On the surface it does seem that it'd be easier, though—like to like and all that—but like told Steve, it's one of the few areas of knowledge that Tony will readily admit he has no clue about. He looks at the pictures again. "Do we even know if they can clone kids?"

"Yes we do," Pepper says. "J.A.R.V.I.S.? Can you show him Neal?"

Instantly another picture joins the hovering collage. This one is of a small, angelically handsome little boy with black hair and vivid blue eyes, with the caption **Neal Burke**. He's standing in a huge room that looks like an atrium done in bronze with a very large metal ring as the centerpiece. Tony figures the ring is the machine that makes the wormholes the SGC likes to whimsically call Stargates, but it's been a long time since he visited Cheyenne Mountain where they keep it, so he's not sure. They put Stargate Command in the same place as N.O.R.A.D. to sell the deep-space telemetry bullshit. But the place where the child's standing doesn't look like the secret lair underneath N.O.R.A.D. that most of the world doesn't know about.

The boy's in front of the ring, wearing jean shorts, blue shoes and mismatched socks, and holding the hand of—hey, weird—the short-haired military dude in the other picture with the soccer ball and the mobile toasters. The small child is grinning beatifically up at the camera like he knows exactly how much of a cherub he is. Something about the clean but messy mop of the kid's black hair makes Tony think of Ward. The sad little jolt that comes with the thought is maybe that much stranger because it's not even all that surprising.

"That's Neal?" Tony asks, peering at the kid. He looks over his shoulder at Pepper. "He's a clone too? Seriously? He looks…"

"Real?" Bruce cuts in with exactly the right word that Tony wasn't going to use.

"Perfect," Tony finishes instead. "Is that another Sheppard or Shepherd or whoever?"

"No." Pepper shakes her head. "The majority of the child's DNA comes from the original donor, but it had degraded over time, so the gaps were filled with DNA from the child's adopted mother."

J.A.R.V.I.S. obligingly adds another three pictures. One of a wholesomely beautiful brunette who is apparently Elizabeth Burke. She has the same eye color as Neal and Tony can see similarities in their faces. The other picture is a photograph right out of the Old West. The young man who had been **ATA Acquisition Subject 4 – Neal Caffery** was probably breathtakingly handsome when he wasn't looking exactly like he was about to be hanged for train robbery. Tony can see definite similarities between him and the little Neal.

The third picture is the human-emulate A.I. ('Neal'—and seriously, the SGC suck at names). But Unlike Shep and Mitch, Neal isn't smiling or even upright. He's lying on what's clearly a lab table, naked except for a towel over his groin. He looks like a sculpture of human perfection except for how he seems unpleasantly dead. The photo caption says he's just undergone extensive repairs.

"They can combine the DNA of up to five individuals," Bruce adds. "But, I guess you'd only need two."

"Two," Tony repeats, totally not getting it. He looks at Pepper, sure by her expression that he's missing something incredibly significant but he's so fucking tired that it's way over his head. "Why would you need two dead bodies?"

Pepper gives him a look that is somehow fond, amused, hopeful and just a tad irritated all in a few impeccable blinks. "We wouldn't need two dead bodies. Just two live ones. Like you and me."

Tony blinks back at her. "They wouldn't be clones, then." He blinks again and this time his eyes stay kind of stuck open. "Wait. You and _me._ You mean…" He looks from her to the picture of Neal, and suddenly the excitement and hope he hasn't been feeling hits him like a punch to the gut and it's a little hard to breathe. "That's…that's somebody's kid," he says, because sure he got what Bruce and Pepper told him, but he didn't _get it_. Not until right this second. "That's somebody's _kid,_ " he says again, because holy God, that is. He is. "That little boy…" He looks back at Pepper, sure he's a little too wild-eyed to be talking about a preschooler but he's just figured it out and this is…it's… "Fucking Stargate Command made somebody a _kid._ "

Pepper nods. She swallows and her eyes are a little wet and whoa, maybe she just got blindsided with the same gut-punch of understanding that he did. "Using parental DNA."

"Neal was the physiological equivalent of a four year-old when that picture was taken," Bruce says quietly. "He was about to be brought to his parents. He's seven now."

His parents, one of whom is Elizabeth Burke. Who gave Neal some of her DNA. "Yeah, okay," Tony says. He doesn't even know what the fuck he's agreeing to, other than all of it. He's having trouble pulling his eyes away from the child on the screen, who has his color hair and Pepper's color eyes, and it is so, _so_ easy to imagine another child there instead; just an older one. And he'd have dark hair and blue eyes, and would argue about bananas and grapes and who would probably think wearing different colored socks was ridiculous.

And Tony is obviously so tired that he's lost his fucking mind, because he misses him. He's standing there in his living room and missing a kid he's never actually had.

(And even worse, maybe, is how easy it is, suddenly, to imagine another kid next to him. A little brother, maybe. With black hair and dark brown eyes.)

Tony scrapes the fingers of both hands through his hair. "Who the hell do we contact? And, provided this isn't some dream I'm having and this is actually even possible, what do we say?" He looks helplessly at Pepper, because she always has the answers and right now he is beyond running on fumes. "Why do you even think they'd help us?"

"Because they didn't have to make that little boy for Elizabeth and Peter Burke, but they did," Pepper says. "And they made him just to save what was left of another human-emulate A.I. who'd been too damaged to survive."

'Neal', of course. "But it says he got fixed." Which is of course completely irrelevant but Tony says it anyway.

"He was nearly destroyed a few days later," Pepper explains, because she gets Tony like no one else on Earth and she is so incredibly awesome. "Too much of his cerebral processor was damaged to make a viable human adult, but there was enough for a child, who could grow and learn.

"Like James," she adds. Because, yeah. James couldn't make a viable human adult either.

(Neither could Ward, not anymore, Tony's brain supplies. Because he's lost his mind and some part of him has apparently decided to just go with it.)

Tony swallows. God, he wants this so badly, and now it's suddenly maybe possible and it's terrifying. "That doesn't sound like the military," he says, because he should know better than to get his hopes up, and that part's true and sane.

But, "Normally, I'd agree," Bruce says, with that lovely understated sarcasm of his. He pulls off his glasses and polishes the lenses on the hem of his shirt. It's only without them that Tony can see the shadows under his eyes and remembers that of course he must be exhausted. He's just come down from Hulking out a few hours ago. "But Stargate Command isn't like the rest of the military." He puts his glasses back on. "And not just because they're the only part that lists interstellar travel in the job description."

Tony smirks joylessly. "Been there, done that. Nearly died."

"It also helps that the ones who are responsible for the clones are part of an international expedition led by a civilian." Pepper puts her hand on Tony's arm again, making him look at her. "They'll help, Tony. I know they will."

"Even without this special magic tech gene?" Tony asks. "Don't get me wrong—I'm not trying to piss on anyone's picnic, here. But, there's nothing in it for them."

"Even without the special magic tech gene, Tony," Pepper says, and she looks absolutely certain.

Tony sighs, then scrubs his face with his palm. "I hope you're right. Because otherwise, I got nothing." And the idea of having to tell Steve that, after all Steve's 'don't give up hope' promises to Bucky, is more awful than Tony wants to contemplate. Lifting his head feels like hefting boulders with his neck. "All right. Who do I need to talk to?"

"No one yet," Pepper says, smiling sweetly. She pats his arm. "I already called them and spoke to Colonel Cameron Mitchell. He assured me he'd call back as soon as he was able to contact Colonel Evan Lorne."

Tony doesn't entirely gape at her, since she's not actually magic—she did have time to do this while he was gently coaxing the Hulk to let go of Bucky. "You mean, 'Mitch', otherwise known as other ridiculously handsome dead pilot?" 

Pepper quirks a reluctantly affectionate smile. "Yes, actually. Colonel Mitchell is the liaison between the SGC and the international expedition I mentioned. We were lucky that he was at Cheyenne Mountain when I called."

"Right." Tony nods. "Sure. Lucky. And why is he going to talk to Colonel Lorne?"

"Because that's Lorne." Pepper points to the soldier who's holding a soccer ball in one picture and in another Neal Burke's little hand. "He's second in command of the military side of the expedition, and Mitchell promised me that he's the best man to talk to about how to rescue James."

* * *

"You're seriously telling me that there's a branch of the military that goes to other planets that has nothing to do with S.H.I.E.L.D." Clint looks at Coulson. "Did you know about this? 'Cause seriously, I had no fucking idea."

"Clint, shut up," Natasha says. She's sitting on a cushion on the floor in between Sam and Clint who are on the really large couch in the tower's common floor. She's leaning against Sam's thigh with one arm wrapped around his leg and her other hand around Clint's ankle. Almost everyone else is on a cushion on the floor, except for Coulson, who's standing with his arms crossed in what could be disapproval, interest or neither. And Tony, who keeps pacing like a madman unless he's answering a question. He's just about manic, and Sam winces internally when he tries to think of the last time Tony slept. For sure none of them went back to bed after the early morning alarm.

There are so many people there—all the Avengers except Bucky, as well as Pepper, Coulson and his two Junior Agents Simmons and Skye—that Sam's surprised they're not in the tower's conference room. But then he looks at Steve, who's sitting on the couch so stiff-spined it must be painful, with one hand fisted on his thigh and the other holding his coffee mug so tightly Sam hopes he won't break it and burn himself.

Sam can see why they're somewhere a lot more comfortable.

"Agent knows about Stargate Command," Tony says for Coulson, who just nods. "But seriously, they could have the fucking _Battlestar Galactica_ in orbit right now and I could not give less of a shit." He makes a sweeping gesture that scatters half the holographic screens like birds before he moves out of the way and they snap back into place. Sam's still reeling a bit about all this. Somehow alien attacks and semi-immortal super soldiers are easier to swallow than perfectly replicated humans. "The fact that the occasional grunt goes to other planets," Tony's still ranting, "is only relevant here because it means that Stargate Command has the tech we need to save Bucky from himselves."

"And it will work. You're sure," Steve says. It doesn't sound like a question, but Sam can still hear the uncertainty in it. "This will fix him."

"Yes," Bruce, Pepper and Tony say all at once.

Sam thinks their certainty is pretty damn comforting, but if anything Steve looks worse.

Steve licks his lips, looks at Tony like he's forcing himself to do it. "What if he doesn't want you to?"

Tony stops mid-step and turns to face him. He blinks a couple times, as if he can't understand what Steve asked him. "I already told you, Sergeant Barnes said he wanted to reintegrate with Bucky. And he said he'd be fine with James being out of Bucky's head, as long as he was safe. Which he would be. Totally."

Steve nods distantly, but then cards the fingers of his free hand through his hair and leaves it on the back of his neck. "I know, but…Sergeant Barnes isn't all of them."

"Who would say no?" Natasha asks him.

"I don't know," Steve says. He shakes his head as if he doesn't like what he's thinking. "It's just…" He takes a breath and looks at Tony again. "This should be Bucky's decision."

Sam expects Tony to argue, but he doesn't. "You're right," he says, nodding. "But even if we could ask him right now, Bucky's literally not in his right mind, so he might not be copus mentis enough for his wishes to be relevant. And the only one besides Bucky who might not want to go anywhere is James himself, and he's a minor." Tony shrugs, hands spread. "I'm sorry, Cap. I know it sucks, but you're his…everything. It has to be you."

"I know." Steve sighs, then squeezes his eyes shut and drops his head. He rubs the back of his neck like he's in pain, and Sam remembers that he is: Steve was injured by the Asset just a few hours ago. Steve nods and that looks like it hurts too, but he lifts his head to look at Tony again. "Of course you have my permission."

"Um, excuse me." Skye is sitting near Coulson, looking like a caterpillar out of Wonderland on the enormous red cushion Thor brought down from his floor. She's sitting cross-legged with her mug of coffee cradled in her lap, her free hand raised like she's in school. "I don't, um, I don't really know what's happening with James—and that's okay—" she adds quickly, as if anyone would accuse her of prying. "But I'm not really sure why Jemma, A.C. and I are here. I mean, you're going to take someone called James out of Bucky's head, right?" She waits until Tony nods. "And that's awesome if it means he can wake up. But…Grant's not going to wake up. Ever. So…" She swallows. "I don't know why we're here."

"I was getting to that," Tony says, just testily enough that Sam hears Pepper's murmured 'Tony' behind him. "Here's the thing," he says to Coulson. "Ward is dying. And according to Docs Zaccaro and Massi, even if he somehow pulls through, he'll barely have enough functional brain left to power a two year-old, let alone an adult. So, when the SGC guys get here with their special equipment, we're going to test it on Ward. And if it works…" He takes a breath. "If it works, I'm going to have Stargate Command use Pepper and my DNA to make James a little brother."

Pepper sits bolt upright, staring at her boyfriend. "When were you going to tell me this?"

Tony whirls so fast to stare at her that for a second Sam thinks he might fall over. "I did tell you. When you and Bruce were tag-team explaining this stuff." He gestures at the pictures, scattering a few of them again. He blinks when she just shakes her head. "I didn't?"

"No, Tony," she says. She presses her lips tightly together as she obviously decides how to react. "We're going to talk about this," she says at last, and Tony's face crumples like she just broke up with him. "I'm not saying no," she adds, and he tentatively lights up again. "But we need to discuss it."

"Yeah. Sure." Tony's head bounces with the vehemence of his nodding.

"You can't seriously be thinking about giving Ward a free pass," Clint says.

Tony turns to Clint, blinking some more. "What are you talking about?"

"I'm talking about you treating Ward like he deserves something better than what he's got," Clint snaps. "He's not Bucky. Ward's not the fucking hard done by _victim_ here. He's a murderer who got made into a better one. So what? His choice, and now he's dying with it."

"Whoa, harsh," Skye says.

"You think that's harsh?" Clint snarls at her. "You think that's _harsh,_ after everything he's done?" He sounds so angry that Sam stares at him. Natasha squeezes his ankle but Clint shakes her off. "He nearly killed Steve, for fuck's sake! And look what he did to Bucky. And what about all the people he did kill?"

"He almost murdered me and my best friend. And Leo may never wake up, either," Simmons says, but Sam can't quite get a bead on her expression.

"See? What about that?" Clint says. He stands up, stalking towards Tony like he's going to punch him. Natasha quietly coils her legs under her, but Clint stops an arm's-length away from Tony. "This is fucking poetic justice, Tony. Some assholes just need to die."

"Clint," Coulson says with soft authority. Clint's still angry but he turns to look at him. "Ward _is_ going to die, with or without his memories. This isn't a free pass. It's not even a temporary reprieve."

"And you're going to let Tony make a—a new version?" Clint demands. "He was a fucking psychopath even before Hydra brainwashed him. Hell, he was _working_ for them."

"Not when he was two," Tony grits out.

"I believe strongly that everyone should have an opportunity to be redeemed," Thor rumbles from the large gold cushion he's using near the wall. "There is none of us with soul so stained that it cannot be washed clean. My own brother taught me that."

"Grant had a really bad childhood," Skye says. "And he did those things so Garrett would love him like a real dad." She looks at Tony, who nods back.

Clint snorts. "Everyone has a lousy fucking childhood. We don't all grow up to be Nazis. He _chose_ that." He whirls on Tony again. "Don't you get it? Some kids are just born for red ledgers, man. You just have to deal with it."

"No one is born bad, Clint," Coulson says with that same gentle weight. Clint spins back to him. "No one," Coulson repeats, looking Clint straight in his blue-green eyes.

Clint blinks, swallows. "You keep saying that," he says, and his voice is rough.

"Because it bears repeating," Natasha tells him. She doesn't smile, but she pats the couch where Clint was sitting in clear invitation.

Clint hesitates, then sighs and goes to sit down. Natasha changes position so that she's leaning against him now.

Sam moves to the floor so he can hold her hand.

"Everyone deserves to be saved," Simmons says. "That's the reason S.H.I.E.L.D. exists, doesn't it?" She looks up at Coulson, who nods and gives her a faint smile. "And…I think it would be right for something good to come out of this, Agent Barton. If Ward gets another chance to, to be a better person, that would…" She swallows, then smiles, but there's a tremor in it. "That wouldn't make up for what he did, but it would help, a bit." 

"Yeah. That was…that was perfect," Tony says. Sam's prepared to make him apologize to the lady for the sarcasm, but he can see by Tony's face that he meant it. Tony lifts his head and looks at Clint, then Coulson. "I'm not asking for permission. I just wanted to tell you what's going to happen. But, yeah." He points at Simmons. "What the other baby-agent said. That's why."

"But we're still talking about it," Pepper says.

"Right." Tony bob-nods again. "But, uh." He spreads his hands. "That's it. Unless any of you have questions. Which I hope you don't, because I'm basically dead on my feet here and passing out in front of you all would just be embarrassing."

"I think we got it," Bruce says. He gets creakily to his feet and gives his cushion back to Thor with a murmur of thanks. "I could use some sleep too."

"Thank you," Steve says to Tony, Pepper and Bruce. It's so heartfelt it's almost painful to hear.

Tony shrugs. "I had nothing to do with it. But, you're welcome." He checks his watch. "Colonel Lorne and Dr. Beckett are going to be here in about eighteen hours." He gives Steve a smile that's a little uncertain. "I'm sure Bucky can hang on until then."

Steve just nods.

"He'd better," Clint says, "Or I'll fucking kill him."

Natasha pats his thigh before she gets up. "You'll have to wait in line."

* * *

"All right," Pepper says once everyone else has left the room. She has her arms crossed, willing her face to look stern but open because she knows she's more anxious than angry. "You need to tell me why you want Ward to be our son. Because I only know bad things about him and I was totally unprepared for this."

Tony crosses his arms too, so obviously defensive that Pepper can't help but soften her features a bit. For all that Tony likes to think he does whatever he wants, he's always heartbreakingly sure everything really important is going to be taken from him. 

"You heard what the little British agentling said—we can wipe out some of the bad stuff he did. And you know, everyone deserves saving."

"While I do agree with that," Pepper says, "that's not what I asked you. Those are reasons to give Ward another chance. Those aren't reasons to adopt him. They aren't reasons for _us_ to adopt him. You have to tell me why."

Tony blinks, and true fear washes across his face before he composes himself again. "James should have a brother. I always wanted a sibling, growing up."

"Tony," Pepper says.

His put-on bluster breaks all at once. He drops is arms into something supplicating. "I don't know, okay?" he bursts out even more defensively, but then wilts when Pepper just looks at him. "I don't know," he says again, much more softly. "It just…it just feels right. I can't explain it. But, it got in my head that we could have a Wardlet too, and now I can't stop thinking about it.

"And he's so much like me, Pep." Tony rubs the back of his neck. He keeps his head down like he can't look her in the eye. "I know I never put a gun to anyone's head, and—thank God—I never intentionally hurt my friends. But I did intentionally keep Stark Industries making weapons for years, because I figured Howard would want me to. And that put a hell of a lot of guns to people's heads, you know?" He looks at her again, but his eyes keep moving away like he's ashamed. "And I'm pretty sure that if I, if I had parents who I thought gave a shit about me, I might've been different. Maybe I wouldn't've kept making murder machines and then looking the other way when they got used."

"You wouldn't be Iron Man," Pepper says.

Tony shrugs and looks down again. "Maybe I would've been someone better."

Pepper blinks, her throat suddenly painful. She hugs Tony fiercely. "You are one of the best people I know, Tony. And I'm friends with Captain America." That elicits the smirk she hoped for, and then Tony hugs her back just as tightly. "I'm scared I won't be able to love him," she says, admitting it. "I know I'm going to love James, and I want to love Ward too. But I don't know him. What if I can't?"

"God, Pep," Tony says. He turns his head and kisses the junction between her shoulder and her neck. "You _are_ the best person I know. And I'm friends with Captain America."

Her laugh is a little too wet to be comfortable. "I wonder if Steve knows that he's the litmus test for decency."

"Don't tell him, it'll just go to his head." Tony kisses her neck again, not letting go. "You are so fucking smart. And good, and patient, and, and just everything." He moves back so he can look at her, and this time his eyes are steady on her own. "I'm sorry I didn't tell you, but I know you'll be able to love him." He smiles lopsidedly. "Hell, you love _me._ I think that means you can love pretty much anyone."

"Don't say that," Pepper retorts immediately. "You're extremely lovable."

Tony grins. "Exactly."


	9. Chapter 9

"Good Lord," Dr. Beckett says the instant he lays eyes on Ward. "What the bloody hell have they done to you, man?" He looks over his shoulder at Steve and Tony. "Was the lad wounded, before they took his arms and legs?" He shakes his head, turning back to Ward. "He looks like a bloody machine."

"The arms were amputated solely to be replaced," Steve says, distantly pleased his voice sounds normal when he's so nervous he wants to scream. "He was shot in one of his legs later on, but they replaced both of them." He read that in the documents they downloaded from the Hydra facility when they took Ward. Steve doesn't think of it as a rescue anymore.

"Plug-and-play assassin," Tony says. He's standing with his hands in his jeans pockets, shoulders slouched but still radiating tension.

"Plug-and-play and totally mess up," Colonel Lorne murmurs. He's also standing with his hands in his pockets. He and Beckett are casually dressed in jeans and tee-shirts, like Steve and Tony. Steve wonders if it means the two men are here on their off time rather than as part of their duties.

Either way, if this works Steve knows he'll never be able to adequately thank them. He already tried, but Lorne just shrugged and smiled and said that since they could help, it would be wrong not to.

It's obvious that Lorne is quietly thrilled to meet Captain America, just like Coulson was. His attempt to be subtle about it would be funny if Steve could find anything remotely funny right now. But Steve's already planning on sending him something, maybe a signed Captain Bearmerica for his daughter. Clint said a toy like that would be worth thousands. Steve can't see why, but he'd gladly give up his shield for this; a souvenir is the very least he can do.

He needs to think of something for Beckett. Bruce can probably help with that.

"Aye. Totally messed up isn't the half of it," Beckett says. He sounds disgusted, his Scottish accent getting broader every time he speaks. He shakes his head again. "I wish Vala was back on—was back here," he says to Lorne. "Hand me that lead, would you?" Lorne hands it over and Beckett gently puts it on Ward's forehead.

Ward looks like he's been in a coma for years, not barely 24 hours. His face is sallow beneath the bright blue Velcro strap holding the breathing tube in place. He occasionally opens his eyes, but it's grotesquely clear he's not seeing anything. And even that minute sign of life is fading along with the rest of him. 

"She won't be back for months," Lorne says. Steve doesn't know what this Vala person could do, but no one needs to add that Ward doesn't have anywhere near that much time. Lorne looks at Steve and Tony. "We have a…consultant, I guess you could call her. She's the only one with the SGC who can use a healing device we have. If she could've come with us, Ward would be healed by now. But where she is, it's extremely difficult just contacting her. I'm sorry."

"Is that like, more special gene stuff?" Tony asks.

Lorne nods. "Something like that."

Tony glances at Steve, and Steve wonders if Tony's thinking the same thing he is, that of course they would've healed Ward if they could. But it might be kinder that they can't.

"All right, that's set," Beckett says. The machine they brought with them looks like a recliner with leads attached to it. Steve's sure that normally the person using it would be in the chair, but for this they just parked it next to Ward's medical cot. One of Tony's laptops is attached to the chair as well, to allow Beckett to see inside Ward's head. So far the screen is blank.

"We're ready." Beckett rubs his hands together, looking a little nervous. He glances at Steve and Tony. "This will likely take a good while. You may want to come back later."

"I'm staying," Tony says.

Steve thanks Beckett and leaves, grateful for the excuse to just not be there for a while.

He goes to see Bucky, though that's hardly better, with Bucky so still and silent. Bucky looks more alive than Ward, but he has the same kind of breathing tube down his throat and leads on his forehead monitoring his brainwaves. The doctors were concerned that he'd burn through the drugs they're using too quickly, but so far he's stayed so deep under that it's like he's not there anymore.

Steve takes his hand. Bucky's not restrained because right now there's no point, but he's still too hot. Steve can feel it just from touching his skin. Bucky's fever isn't nearly as bad as when his left arm was steaming from the rain, but Steve's sure that if Bucky were awake his temperature would just start climbing again. Even with his brain activity artificially reduced to almost nothing, Bucky still can't quiet his head. Steve can only imagine how exhausted he must be.

No wonder he tried to jump. Sergeant Barnes said as much.

"Just hang on," Steve says. "There are people helping us now. They brought a special machine with them that can take James and the Asset out of your head, so everyone else can stop fighting.

"I know you're tired. I know how hard this has been. But you've survived so much, Bucky. You've gotten through things that I don't even think I could. And you're still here, and still the bravest man I know. And you're always going to be my best guy, and I love you." He smiles a little, pushes some of Bucky's messy hair off his forehead. "'Til the end of the line."

Steve leans over and kisses Bucky's forehead, then gently places Bucky's hand back at his side. He needlessly adjusts the blanket before he leaves.

Tony sees him as Steve's walking out of the medical suite, and he gives Steve a thumbs-up before he turns back to Ward and Beckett and the machine.

Steve goes to the waiting room outside the medical suite and paces, waiting.

* * *

It takes two hours.

Two fucking hours just to scoop up what's left of Ward's mind. Fast and dirty, except for how it isn't either of those things. Beckett's eyes are fixed on the screen like it's his own life scrolling by, rather than the random, flickering wreckage of someone he's never met.

But every so often Beckett grimaces, and Tony leans forward, trying to see anything on the screen that means they're done; that there aren't enough memories left for even a baby. But if anything it's the opposite. There're too many memories; it's just that they're all terrible ones.

Ward has almost no coherent memories after what Hydra did to him. But what's left is a cesspool of self-loathing, rage and terror. That's what ends up taking so long: Beckett has to sort through the mess to find anything good, anything worth keeping. There's so little.

Lorne is purposely standing so he can't see the screen. Tony can't blame him, but he can't take his eyes off the computer either. This will be his son, if he's lucky. If there's enough. He can't not know.

"Bloody monsters, all of them," Beckett says, his voice hushed with miserable awe. On screen a little boy is drowning. It's not Ward; Tony doesn't know who it is. But it's just a flash and then it's gone. And then Ward's about to be wiped, or being tortured for some imaginary infraction, or shaking uncontrollably after shooting a little girl. "I wouldn't treat a dog like this. Did they do this to the Sergeant too?"

"Yeah." Tony clears his throat. On the screen a very young Ward is getting hugged by his teacher. _Thank God,_ Tony thinks.

Beckett captures it with a tap of his finger.

There are other nice things. A few, anyway. Tony sees a big, happy dog, and the safety of being alone, and a game of tag and pretty much everything to do with being part of Coulson's team, especially Skye. But Tony has no idea how that could be patched together into some kind of whole.

Beckett seems to, though. Tony tries to feel sanguine about that.

"There's a wee bit more than I thought, from what your doctor told me," Beckett says finally.

Tony blinks at him, because to him it looked like nothing. Barely a few blips of joy in an otherwise miserable life. "How much more?"

"That's hard to say, I'm afraid." Beckett frowns, thinking. "I won't know for sure until I'm back home and I can mesh them properly, but I think…a three year-old. Maybe. Two and a half." He smiles. "But there's enough. Enough good memories to work with. Congratulations." He sticks out his hand as if Tony's already a father.

Tony shakes Beckett's hand, thinking about how he'd said Ward had barely enough brain function to power a two year-old. Turns out he was right. "That's…that's not a lot."

"Look at it this way," Lorne says. Tony had all but forgotten he was there. "He has a whole new lifetime now, to fill with good memories." He smiles. "That's actually pretty cool."

"Yeah," says Tony, really thinking about it: a whole new lifetime of second chances, for Ward to grow up loved the way he should have been. To learn how to be good, instead of broken and afraid. To be happy. "Yeah, it actually is."

* * *

Steve doesn't stay while Beckett extracts James' memories. They're Bucky's, not Steve's. He has no right to see them.

Tony disappears somewhere, probably to his workshop. Steve stays in the waiting room. At some point Bruce brings him something to eat, which he does his best to finish. Natasha brings him one of his sketchbooks and tells him to stop pacing. Steve sits down, but it doesn't help.

He starts to draw Bucky, some happy memory that he can keep, if…

Steve leaves it half-finished.

* * *

"That's it," Lorne says. "It's done."

Steve looks up, blinking, then gets up so fast he almost knocks the chair over. "J.A.R.V.I.S., get Tony up here. Beckett and Lorne say they're done. That's it? Really?" he asks them.

"Aye." Beckett nods. He looks tired, but that makes sense. It's been eight hours since they started with Ward, Steve realizes. Beckett smiles and that's tired as well, but there's satisfaction in it. And that more than anything is what threatens to take out Steve's legs in relief.

Beckett pats the chair-like machine they wheeled out of the medical suite. "We have Ward and James, safe and sound." He shakes his head in something like rueful admiration. "James was easier than Ward—far more to work with, there—but complicated. He was like a bloody ball of yarn that the kitten's got at, all tangled up in the other identities."

"I'm here, I'm right here," Tony says, bursting out of the elevator. He's all but dragging Pepper by the hand with his long, anxious strides. "What did you say about 'tangled'?" he asks Beckett immediately. "You could still get James, right? He's okay?"

"We did, and he's fine," Lorne says quickly. "The doc was just saying that James' memories threaded through everyone else's. It was a lot of work for Beckett to extract him."

"But you were able to?" Pepper asks.

"And it didn't hurt the others?" Steve says.

"No, they're all fine," Lorne says.

Beckett nods, smiling at them. "We were able to. And just like the Colonel says, the other identities weren't affected." His mouth twists in a wince. "I won't lie. Most of the poor lad's history is as terrible as Ward's, but I'm not sure how much I can safely remove without it making James a much younger barin, like I had to do with Ward."

Tony and Pepper share a look. "How much younger?" Pepper says.

"Hard to say, I'm afraid," Beckett tells her. "Five or six, I think, if I leave some of the bad memories."

"Whoa," Tony says. "That's if you leave _some_ of the bad memories?" He gapes at Steve. "How the hell did he ever—" He cuts himself off, shaking his head. "Never mind. I don't want to know. Fuck."

"You can't take too much, or he'll think he's back in the 1920s," Steve says to Beckett.

"That doesn't matter," Tony says. "He's a kid. Kids adapt. He'll adapt."

"No, Tony. We can't do that to him." Pepper shakes her head. "He's been through enough. He shouldn't have to deal with culture shock all over again." She glances at Steve, as if she can see how sometimes he feels like a living example of culture shock. "And he's brave, and resilient. We can help him deal with the bad memories, but at least he'll know who he is and where he comes from."

"I agree with Ms. Potts, for what it's worth." Lorne shrugs apologetically. "I…my whole base caught a pretty bad disease that gave everyone amnesia." He grimaces at the memory. "Two hundred people, and none of them with the first clue who they were or where they were or what the hell they were doing there. It was a nightmare. I don't think I've ever been so scared, and I was better off than most of them."

"It was a bit like that for me when I woke up in 2011," Steve says. He looks at Tony. "At least Bucky recognized the world he woke up in. Don't take that away."

"If I take just the worst—though that'll be bloody difficult to pare down, believe me—he'll be about six years old, I think, but he'll have enough memories to orient himself," Beckett says.

Tony looks at Beckett, Steve, and then Pepper. Whatever he sees on her face makes him drop his head in defeat, but he's nodding. "I just don't want him to have to remember all the shit that's happened to him," he says. "He's suffered enough." 

Pepper rubs his back. "He'll be all right, Tony. We'll help him get through it."

"I promise, we'll minimize any suffering," Beckett says gravely. "But I also think that they're the lad's memories, for better or worse. We shouldn't just be yanking them away from him."

Tony sighs. "All right." He smiles at Pepper and she squeezes his hand. 

"What happened to the Asset?" Steve asks. He's dreading the answer, in case Natasha and Tony were wrong and the killer is an essential part of James. But he also desperately needs to know.

"Gone," Beckett says. "Deleted."

"Oh, my God." Pepper puts her hand over her mouth. "You didn't…he wasn't a person, was he?"

"No. Not at all," Beckett says immediately, shaking his head, and Steve can't stop his own exhale of relief.

"He was more like a…mask. Or a shield," Lorne takes up the explanation. "He was kind of overlaid on James' personality, like, basically a different version of him. And yeah, I can imagine how that sounds," he adds, because the idea of the Asset being essentially the same as a child sounds completely insane.

But, "That actually makes sense," Tony says, and everyone stares at him. "The Asset was really childlike, in a lot of ways. Like, he needed explicit instructions for everything. And kids can be horrible, violent little fucks sometimes. Hey, don't tell me they can't," he adds immediately at Lorne's expression. "I'll bet you bit someone at least once in preschool. And I know how much of a delinquent you were, Cap, picking fights all the time. So, yeah. The Asset was like, James gone all _Lord of the Flies_ who actually did what you told him to." 

Lorne blinks. "I guess so," he says, though he looks like he hates considering it. "But there wasn't enough of the Asset to exist on his own. We didn't hurt him," he adds, looking seriously at Pepper. "We wouldn't have deleted him if there really was anyone there."

"And James wasn't affected," Beckett adds.

"Thank you. That's really good to hear," Pepper says.

"What happens now?" Steve asks.

"Now we take the memories and Mr. Stark's and Ms. Pott's skin samples back to our base, and in about two months I'll bring back your boys." Lorne's smile is kind, like he knows exactly how Tony and Pepper are feeling. "I have a daughter of my own, so when I promise that we'll take good care of them, you can know I mean it."

Tony nods. "I saw your pictures with the toddler robots, and Neal. I know you will."

"We've done this several times now," Beckett says. "All the children have been just fine."

"Thank you," Tony says thickly. "Seriously. Just…wow. Thank you."

Pepper nods. "Oh, yes. Thank you." She looks at Tony. "This is actually happening, isn't it? This is actually happening." She makes a noise that's almost a laugh. "I'm terrified."

Tony puts his arm around her. "Me too. It'll be awesome."

Lorne laughs. "I think everyone's terrified, more or less. Even my wife was scared, and she's normally completely unflappable."

Steve smiles at that along with Pepper and Tony, but inside he's quaking. Pepper's 'this is actually happening' feels like it's resonating down to his bones.

_This is actually happening._ James is away; the Asset is gone. Bucky could be all right.

Could be. Steve doesn't know yet, and he's quaking.

"Excuse me," he says, polite as he can be, considering. "Thank you. I can't thank you enough. But, I'd like to see Bucky."

He can barely make himself stay though the exchange of goodbyes before he rushes back into the medical suite. He doesn't run only because he might hit someone in the relatively small spaces.

Dr. Massi and a nurse are in Bucky's room, carefully pulling the breathing tube out of his mouth. He's still unconscious, but it must be good if he's breathing on his own.

"I was wondering when you'd come back," Massi says, giving him a warm smile. "Sergeant Barnes' fever's slowly going down. We're easing him back to consciousness, but with his metabolism he should be completely awake in just a few hours."

"Okay," Steve says faintly. He sways suddenly, but catches himself on the bedframe before his legs give out.

Instantly the nurse has his other arm. "Whoa, there. Let's get you sitting."

Steve doesn't protest when Massi moves the chair and the nurse helps him get to it. Steve hasn't come close to fainting since before the serum, but he still remembers to lean over with his head between his knees, taking deep breaths to oxygenate his brain. "Sorry."

"Nothing to apologize for, Captain," the nurse says. He pats Steve's back. "Enough stress will take anybody down."

"Guess so," Steve croaks when he's able to sit up without his head spinning. The last time he felt stress like this was when he faced Bucky across the catwalk of a helicarrier, begging him to stand down before Steve had to fight his best friend.

Bucky was the Asset then; he hadn't cared. Now Steve wonders if it was Bucky or James who'd hesitated before taking the final swing. Or if it was Bucky, James or Vanya who'd pulled him out of the water.

It doesn't matter, he realizes. It was Bucky, that's what's important. And now James and the Asset are gone, and his fever's going down. He's going to live.

Bucky's going to live.

Steve's breath hitches and then he's crying, covering his eyes with his trembling hands. The relief _hurts._ He's aching with it, but that's all right. Bucky's going to live.

Steve doesn't know if Bucky will be okay yet, but he's alive, and he's going to live, and that's enough. If Bucky's alive then they'll have time for anything.

* * *

"We need to think of names," Pepper says, the absolute second Colonel Lorne, Dr. Beckett and the memory thing that looks like a barcalounger by way of _Star Trek_ vanish in a beam of light.

"That was really cool," Tony says. "I want one of those. Can the SGC give me one of those?"

"I don't think Stargate Command is in the habit of handing out beaming devices," Pepper says.

"How about a space ship? Actually, I don't need a space ship. My suit can go into space. Or I can make a ship of my own. What would you think of _The Stark Pepper_?"

"Tony," Pepper says, patience bleeding out of her voice. "Names for the _children_. Not hypothetical space ships."

"Right, right. Sorry. I'm just…" Tony grins at her, sure it's kind of crazy but whatever. "I don't think 'excited' covers it. I think 'freaked the fuck out' is closer. But, yeah. Names."

Pepper takes his hand, leading him to the elevators. "J.A.R.V.I.S., please let us know when Bucky is ready for visitors," she says, then smiles at him. Her grin's a little crazy-looking too, which is strangely comforting. "We have to keep the name 'James', of course, because it's his. But I think we should give him a new middle name. It will help cement his identity as separate from Bucky."

"Yeah. Good idea," Tony says once they're both in the elevator. "And 'James' can be for Rhodey anyway. You should chose the middle name, though. To be fair."

"Thomas," Pepper says instantly. "It was my father's name." Her smile's kind of wistful. "I promised myself after he died that I'd name my first son after him."

"Well, you just did," Tony says.

She beams, then kisses him until the elevator chimes to remind them the doors are open.

"So," she says, as she elegantly steps onto their floor, "we have James Thomas Stark—"

"Stark-Potts," Tony says.

Pepper wrinkles her sweetly freckled nose. "Between you and me, I have always hated my last name. I really would prefer it if they just had yours."

"I like your last name," Tony says. "Okay, okay. We won't use it. They'll just be Starks," he amends at her miserable expression, palms raised in surrender.

"Thank you. So, that's James." They're in the kitchen and she goes to start up the coffee machine. "So, what about Ward? He'll be little enough that we can give him a new first name, I think. And to be honest, I hate the name 'Grant'. I actually like 'Ward', though."

"We can't call him Ward," Tony says, shaking his head. "His handlers—Hydra, the sons of bitches who had him." He pauses. "Daughters of bitches, actually. But that's the name they used for him. I can't use it for our own kid. Just the idea of it makes my skin crawl." 

Ward was the name of the tortured monster dying in the medical suite. Tony is waiting for J.A.R.V.I.S. to tell him when the poor, miserable husk is gone, and his name will go with him. It wasn't even a name at the end, anyway. Just a label. 

"I hadn't thought of it like that," Pepper says. "You're right. Of course we can't use it." She finishes setting up the coffee machine, then stands watching it work as she thinks. "What about Joshua?"

"James and Joshua?" Tony blinks incredulously. "You're seriously going to give them each 'J' names? No. We are not doing that. Unilateral decision coming down, here. No first names starting with the same letter."

The unimpressed look Pepper gives him reminds Tony strangely of James. "Benjamin."

Tony shakes his head again. "Nope. His nickname will be 'Benji', and that's a dog's name. Virginia."

"Yes, what?" Pepper says, then realizes Tony suggested it as a name for the toddler and she looks actually horrified. "Virginia is a girl's name."

"It's a state. That automatically makes it unisex. And I think it'd be awesome to name a kid after you."

"No. Thank you, but, seriously." Pepper is still gaping at him. "'Virginia' is an _actual_ girl's name. The male version is 'Virginius'."

Tony blinks. "Ew."

"Exactly. How about we go for something sane? What about Howard?"

"We are naming _nobody_ after my father," Tony snaps, shocking himself with his own vehemence. "Sorry," he amends quickly. "But, no. I can't do that."

"That's fine," Pepper says gently. "What about 'Anthony', then?" Her smile is as gentle as her voice. "You're certainly worthy of passing on your name."

Tony smiles back at her, even as he's shaking his head. "They've already got my last name. And he should be his own person, you know? And…Oh, hey—Ash!"

"Ash?"

Tony bounds towards her, excited. "Ash! We can call him 'Ash'. It's perfect. It's the name of the hero from _The Evil Dead_ movie, so it's both classic _and_ badass. And it's totally awesome."

Pepper's blinking at him again, but she's not shutting him down and he can practically see the beautiful wheels turning in her head as she mulls it over. "It's very…American," she says at last. "Which isn't necessarily a bad thing. But would it be short for 'Ashley'? Or 'Asher'?"

"Neither. Just Ash. _Ash._ " Tony moves his hand in front of him, mentally lighting up a scrolling marquee. " _Ash Stark._ It's _epic._ "

Pepper looks like she's trying not to laugh, which makes Tony laugh, and then Pepper really does laugh, and he looks at her and God, she's perfect. She's perfect and they're going to have kids, and when the hell did he ever do anything good enough to deserve this?

Pepper stops laughing. "What's wrong?"

Tony shakes his head mutely, wipes his eyes with the heels of his hands. "Nothing. Nothing's wrong." He smiles wetly at her. "I'm just really happy."

"Oh, Tony," she says. Her next laugh's kind of wet as well, and then she throws herself into his arms. "I love you. And yes, we can call him Ash. Ash Collins Stark, for your mother."

"Because it's awesome," Tony says, just to hear her laugh again.

* * *

Jemma doesn't come to say goodbye to Grant. Skye can't blame her.

Skye's there, though. She never even considered not going. A.C. is as well, of course. So is Tony, which she kind of understands. Trip's there too, standing respectfully next to the door with his hands folded in front of him. Skye knows Trip came out of respect for Coulson, not Grant. After all, he only knew Grant as an enemy.

Skye did too, really. But she's still here.

May's not, but in the end she _hated_ Grant, so Skye can't blame her, either.

This is the last thing Dr. Zaccaro has to do tonight before her shift ends. She looks completely professional, while she checks and rechecks the machines monitoring Grant's vital signs. They'll take his organs for donation after his death: one final, positive thing to come out of his sad and brutal end.

Grant's breaths are deep and even from the machine feeding air into his lungs, and his heart beats in silent, perfect spikes on the screen. His lungs and his heart are the only parts of him that move. His brainwaves are constant flat lines. This is the brain death Tony was talking about, but Massi denied. No one's denying it anymore.

"Grant Ward is gone," Zaccaro says. "There's no brain activity. At this point only the machines are sustaining him. If you'd like some privacy, before…" she trails off uncomfortably. Skye wonders if the doctor's ever had to do this before. She kind of hopes not.

"I would, if that's okay," Skye says, then looks around at the others. "I mean, unless anyone else wants to go first?"

"No, that's fine." Coulson smiles at her, one of his sad ones. "We'll wait outside."

He leaves and Trip follows him. So does Zaccaro, but Tony hesitates, then wraps his hand around Grant's.

"Goodbye, kid," he says to Grant's still form. "We'll take good care of you, I promise." He gently lets go, then leaves, giving Skye a nod as he passes.

And then it's just her.

Skye goes to Grant's bed. "Hey," she says stupidly. "I know…I know you're not in there, but…" She takes a breath. "But I just wanted to say that I'm sorry. I'm so sorry about what they did to you. Everybody—Garrett, and Taylor, and your parents. Anybody who hurt you and made you feel you were only good for hurting other people. Because you weren't. You…" She swallows and has to blink a few times before her throat doesn't hurt too much. "You did a lot of good things, Grant. I just wish you knew that."

She takes his hand the way Tony did, but it's too cold and too lax and she lets it go. "I wish you remembered that you saved Jemma and me. I wish you knew that you weren't a monster until they made you into one. I wish…" Skye takes another breath, wiping her eyes. "I wish you knew that we loved you. And that I loved you. I wish you knew what that even was."

She kisses his forehead, making sure not to bump the tube in his throat. "Goodbye, Grant. I love you," she whispers, then straightens up and turns around and leaves.

Skye manages a 'thank you' to the doctor around the clog in her throat, then goes right to Coulson.

He doesn't even blink before he wraps his arms around her and she starts bawling. 

"It's okay, it's okay," he says, like it will be. And even through her tears Skye believes him.

* * *

"Hi," Steve says, when Bucky's eyes finally open. It's not the first time that afternoon, but this is the first time that Steve can tell Bucky's really awake behind them.

"Hi," Bucky repeats, still blinking. He frowns. "You okay?"

"What? Yeah. Yeah, I'm fine," Steve says, confused. He was smiling. He's still smiling.

"Your hand's shaking," Bucky explains. He bends his metal elbow to lift Steve's hand, and Steve blinks to see that his is shaking so badly it's making Bucky's left hand vibrate too. He hadn't noticed.

"Sorry. I guess I was a little worried."

"No fooling," Bucky smirks, but he refuses to let go of Steve's hand when he tries to pull away.

"How are you feeling?" Steve asks. Bucky's hand is warm, but not too warm, mimicking Bucky's normal temperature. His nose isn't bleeding and when Zaccaro last checked him she said he was physically fine. But Steve's heart is still rattling in his chest like it used to do when he overextended himself, which happened when he did almost anything. And right now he feels pretty damn overextended.

"Fine," Bucky says automatically. "My throat kind of hurts, but…" He turns to look up at the ceiling, expression puzzled. "Something's different," he says. His brow furrows as he concentrates, searching. "They're not there." He looks at Steve, eyes widening. "Where's James? What happened to him?" Bucky sits up, searching the room with his eyes like he's missing a physical presence. His breathing speeds up and when he looks at Steve again it's clearly in leashed panic. "Where is he?"

"He's safe, he's all right," Steve says immediately. He puts his hands on Bucky's shoulders, not to restrain him but in support, and Bucky automatically holds Steve's arms. "He's safe. Some scientists Tony knows came and removed him, while you were out. But he's not gone, okay? They're going to make him real. He'll be a little boy in his own body."

Bucky just stares at him. "How?"

Steve smiles again. "I honestly have no idea. They brought a machine that can remove memories, and they…took everything to do with James, but left you the rest. But he's fine, Buck. I promise. I would never have let them do anything if I wasn't sure of it."

Bucky nods distantly, eyes moving again as he looks inward. "But…I remember him." He looks at Steve again. His eyes are still wide, but now it's in surprise, not panic. "I remember him being there, and…and what happened. But…but it's…it's mine. Not…" He grimaces, then shuts his eyes and clenches his jaw. "Fuck. I remember—"

"Bucky? Bucky!" Steve waits, letting Bucky clutch him until whatever he's experiencing passes and he's able to let go.

"Fuck." Bucky curls in on himself, pressing the heels of his hands over his eyes. "I'm okay," he says, before Steve can even ask. He pulls his hands away to hug himself, breathing heavily and staring at nothing. He doesn't look okay.

"Bucky?"

"I'm okay," he says again, though his voice is too rough to make Steve believe it. He really doesn't look it, but Steve just waits until Bucky blinks and comes totally back to himself. "I didn't remember, before. How much what they did hurt," he says. He looks at Steve again. "I mean, I _did,_ but, I didn't."

"What was it?" Steve asks. Then, "I mean, you don't have to tell me. I don't want to—"

Bucky shakes his head, cutting him off. "S'okay. Just took me by surprise, is all." He swallows and looks back at the wall, eyes going distant. "It was the factory," he says, and Steve's blood runs cold. "Just, what happened. The experiments." He lets out a breath. "It hurt."

"Yeah," Steve says. "I remember how you looked when I found you. It was…it was pretty bad."

Bucky nods, eyes still too far away, but then he blinks and looks at Steve again, obviously pulling himself back. He gives Steve a lopsided grin. "I remember you surprised the hell out of me. You were a damn giant. I thought I was hallucinating."

Steve grins back, fighting not to show any signs of his disappointment. He fiercely reminds himself that what he told Bucky before is still just as true: Bucky and Barnes aren't different people; they never were. "It was strange for me too, believe it or not. I kept expecting you to still be taller than me."

"Yeah, I kinda miss that, sometimes," Bucky says. He grins. "It was nice, tucking you under my arm like a dame."

Steve rolls his eyes. "Yeah. That was so romantic. You're such a charmer, Sergeant."

"Sergeant?" Bucky repeats. His smile quirks in puzzlement. "You going all formal on me now, Captain?"

"What?"

"What?" Bucky parrots again. He's looking truly puzzled now. "You haven't called me Sergeant since you were leading the Commandos."

"I've been calling you Sergeant Barnes for the past few days," Steve says, not sure if he should be concerned or not. "Okay. I hate to ask this, but, who am I talking to?"

"Okay…" Bucky says, "I think one of us is loony-tunes, and it ain't me. I'm Bucky." He's speaking slowly enough to be patronizing if he weren't so obviously confused. "James Buchanan Barnes? Your best pal?" He smiles again, but it's a little worried. "I know everyone else still uses it, but I ain't been a sergeant since I fell outta the train."

Steve tries very, very hard not to gape at him. "I'm sorry. I'm sure this sounds insane, and I don't want to…to upset you. But I need you to tell me everything you remember about my rescuing you from the factory. Everything you can. Please."

Bucky's expression is distinctly dubious, but he nods. "All right. Um, I was kind of out of it. Just repeating my name, rank and serial number, right?" He looks at Steve for confirmation. Steve nods. "Yeah. And then there was suddenly this freaking blond giant in a blue helmet with a big 'A' right in the middle of his forehead. And then you said, 'Bucky?" And I realize that, holy fuck—it's you. It's Steve goddam Rogers." He smirks. "I swear, for a minute I was sure I'd lost my mind."

"Bucky," Steve says, stopping him. "After your fight with Ward, after you'd…hurt your arm. You told me that was James, when I came to rescue you."

Bucky nods. "Yeah. Poor kid."

"Okay. But after, it was…you called yourself Sergeant Barnes, and you said that he—that version of you—took over to walk across the beam. 

"He was you. Just…a different version of you," Steve says again when Bucky just looks at him blankly. "More…more of a soldier, I guess. I could trust you to do anything. It was like, you never failed or backed down…You didn't complain anymore, either. Not after the factory. You didn't laugh much, though. And you were more distant, not as relaxed around me anymore. And you stayed Sergeant Barnes until you fell and he died."

Bucky just keeps staring at him. "You know that makes no fucking sense."

Steve stares back. "Sergeant Barnes told me that you were behind him, that he'd taken over to keep you safe. He sliced up his— _your_ —left shoulder, trying to kill the Asset."

Bucky looks at his left arm. "Is that why I got a new arm? I thought it got fucked up during the fight with Ward."

"Well, it did, but…You don't remember that? Really?"

"Nope." Bucky shakes his head guilelessly. "Believe me, I remember every fucking second of the Howling Commandos. And falling out of the train and…and lots of shit that happened before and after that I really, really wish I didn't. But I don't remember being behind anyone. And the last thing I know for sure wasn't me hallucinating when my brain was baking in my skull was thinking you'd been shot dead in an alley and freaking the fuck out."

"Oh," Steve says, distant with surprise. "So…so you're alone in there?" He makes a gesture at his head that's probably too vague to look like anything. "There's…it's just you?"

"Naw," Bucky says easily. "Vanya's still back there. He says 'hi'."

"Oh, no," Steve says on a sharp exhale. "He's awake? Are you fighting him?" He runs his fingers though his hair, the sudden fear painful in his chest. "Do you need…wait. Was that a _joke?_ " he demands, because Bucky's grinning.

"Yeah," Bucky says, still grinning. "He's quiet as a little Russian mouse." He smirks. "Had you going, huh?"

Steve blinks at him, then bursts out laughing. "Jerk," he gasps, then grabs Bucky and hugs him as hard as he can, because he's laughing too hard to kiss him. "You're really okay, aren't you?" Steve says when he can breathe again. "God, Buck. You're really okay."

"Well, yeah, I said so, didn't I?" Bucky's still grinning unrepentantly. "Sheesh. It's like you don't listen."

"Yeah. Yeah you did," Steve says. "I love you. I'm so glad you're okay."

"I love you too, punk," Bucky says, but it's Steve who leans in first and kisses him.

Steve can feel Bucky's gratified sigh against his mouth and breaths him in, cradling the back of his head with his fingers tangling in Bucky's unruly hair. Bucky's left hand is on the back of Steve's neck, as warm and alive and perfect as the rest of him. Bucky's right hand is holding Steve's side, and Steve gently pulls it away so he can link their fingers. Bucky lets him, and holds on tight.

"God, I missed you," Steve says when they break apart. He lets go of Bucky's hand so he can hug him again. "I was so scared, Buck. I'm so glad you're all right."

"Me too," Bucky says just as seriously. He turns his head and drops a chaste kiss on the side of Steve's neck, patting his back. "But you're crushing me here, and if I don't get a shower soon I'm seriously going to lose it."

"I'm afraid that I can't allow you to access any facilities or appliances in the building without one of the Avengers or Ms. Potts as an escort," J.A.R.V.I.S. says.

"What? Why the hell not?" Bucky pulls back from Steve. "I get sick and suddenly I can't use a shower on my own anymore?"

"Or a coffeemaker, Sergeant," J.A.R.V.I.S. adds helpfully. "And I'm also afraid that sir expressly forbade me from listening to you until I could assure him that I wouldn't be, I quote, 'fooled by your wiliness anymore'."

"'Wiliness'?" Bucky repeats, looking bewildered. 

Steve shrugs. "You did get by his programming a couple of times."

"I did?" Bucky still looks confused as he gets out of the bed. He glances up at the ceiling like he expects to see the A.I. laughing at him. "With a coffeemaker?"

"Not exactly," Steve says.

* * *

"Tony, please stop pacing. You're making me nervous."

Tony stops at the window. He turns around and hesitates, then crosses back to the kitchen table and sits across from Pepper. He takes a drink from the mug of coffee that's been sitting there so long it has a film on it, looking like he's not even aware of what he's doing. "Sorry," he says after wiping his mouth.

She puts her hand over his. "It's just a few more minutes, now. Happy said they're almost here."

"I know. Hence the pacing," Tony says. He runs his fingers through his hair, then looks down at his tee-shirt with a graphic of the band _Gamma Ray_ on it. "This isn't too violent, is it? I don't want to make Evan Lorne think I'm dangerous."

Pepper peers at his shirt. "I can't even tell what that is." She squeezes Tony's hand. "If Evan thinks anything uncomplimentary about you at all, it would be that you send too many emails." 

"I don't think there's anything wrong with wanting to know how my kids are doing," Tony says. He checks his watch and grimaces. "Why didn't we tell them to come earlier?"

"Because this was the earliest they could get here," Pepper says gently. She's anxious too. Extremely anxious. But as usual with Tony, keeping him calm helps to calm her down as well. "And there's nothing wrong at all with wanting to know how our kids are doing. But even I think that fifty emails in one day is probably excessive."

Tony shrugs. "I kept thinking of stuff. And don't tell me you weren't happy to know that Ash doesn't need diapers."

"I was extremely happy to know that," Pepper admits easily. She decides not to mention that Evan volunteered that information in the first email he sent, before Tony bombarded him with questions ranging from exact hair color ('Burnt sienna and a kind of light auburn') to the boy's food preferences ('They just got born, Tony. They haven't eaten'). Frankly, Pepper is astonished that not only did Evan actually respond to all of them, but all his answers were polite. She's wanted to strangle Tony for less.

"Well, there you go, then," Tony says. But he sounds distracted and she's not surprised when a minute later he's on his feet again. "I can't take this," he says, stalking to the window. "I can't take this. I am seriously going to drop dead from anxiety any second." He spins towards her, looking at her beseechingly. "What if they don't like me? What if I do something terrible and ruin them?"

"Oh, honey, they'll love you," Pepper says. She gets up from the table and goes to him so she can look him in his big, worried eyes. "And you won't ruin them. We're both going to make mistakes because we're human. But we'll be prepared for it, so when we do mess up, we'll apologize, fix it and move on. Together.

"It'll be fine, Tony, I promise," she says, hugging him. "James already likes you. I know he and Ash will love you just as much as I do. You're not going to mess this up. You can't, because you already care enough to be afraid you might."

"I'm not sure that makes enough sense to be comforting," Tony says, but he rests his forehead against hers and doesn't let her go. "I don't think I've been this scared about anything in my life. How can you be so sure?"

"Because I know you," Pepper says. "And the same man who sent Evan fifty emails in one day and asked my head of security drive them from the airport isn't going to ruin them."

"You say that _now_ ," Tony says, and Pepper laughs even though she knows he's not really joking.

"Excuse me, sir and Ms. Potts," J.A.R.V.I.S. intones from the ceiling, "I've been asked to inform you that Happy is just pulling up outside the main entrance."

"Oh, my God." Pepper lets go of Tony and steps back, her heart suddenly hammering like it hasn't all morning. "Oh, my God. They're here."

Tony looks at her, eyes huge, and then they're both running for the elevator like the tower's on fire.

They walk more-or-less calmly into the lobby, in time to see Evan Lorne and another man who she's sure is Colonel John Sheppard come through the huge main doors. Evan's carrying a large black, very stuffed duffel bag in one hand and leading a boy who can't be anyone other than James with the other. Sheppard is carrying Ash in his arms.

James hollers " _TONY!_ " the instant he sees him, then breaks away from Evan and runs at Tony full-tilt. Tony barely has enough time to prepare himself before his arms are full of child.

One of Evan's many, many emails in response to Tony's confirmed that James is now around five and a half. He's definitely small, but solid, like Tony himself. When Tony catches him he grunts and almost stumbles backwards into Pepper.

"James?" he says, looking in amazement at the little boy in his arms. James grins at him.

"Ms. Potts?"

Pepper tears her eyes away from James and swings around. Sheppard adjusts his hold on Ash so she can take him more easily. "Colonel John Sheppard, Stargate Command," he says, grinning disarmingly at her. "But I bet you're a little more interested in Ash Collins Stark. He's about two and a half, and I know he's excited to meet you."

"Pepper Potts. I'm very glad to meet you in person, Colonel," she says, though it's mostly automatic. Her attention is entirely focused on the boy in his arms, who's staring at her with enormous, dark brown eyes.

"Hey, little guy," Sheppard says to Ash, "you want to say hi to your Mommy?"

Ash nods slowly, never taking his eyes away from Pepper. He has dark ginger (burnt sienna) hair and a smattering of freckles, and his expression is so rapt it's hard to tell if he's breathing.

"Hello, Ash," Pepper says to the little boy. "My name is Pepper. I'm so excited to meet you." She puts her arms out. "May I hold you?"

Ash nods again. He leans towards her and Sheppard puts him gently into her arms. Ash wraps his legs around her, then puts his hands on either side of Pepper's face, looking earnestly into her eyes.

"He's quite the romantic," Sheppard tells her. "He was charming the socks off everyone back at the base. I don't think he's actually had his feet on the floor yet."

"It's so good to see you, Ash," she says, smiling at his serious little face. "I like the dinosaurs on your jammies. Do you like dinosaurs?"

He nods very soberly. "You smell like flowers."

"Oh." Pepper blinks. "Oh, thank you." 

Ash lets go of her face so he can wrap his arms around her neck and put his head on her shoulder.

"Look, Tony," she says, turning so Tony can see Ash in her arms. "Look, isn't he perfect? They're both amazing. Hello, James."

"Hi, Pepper!" James has his legs wrapped around Tony's waist, which is good because he leans so far backwards to look at her that he's practically parallel to the floor. "Look." He grins and points at his mouth. "I gotta loose tooth."

"That's wonderful," Pepper says. She leans over carefully so she can kiss his hair without dropping Ash. "I missed you."

"Me too." James nods enthusiastically.

"He's five and a half," Tony says, grabbing James and smacking him against his chest. "Look how big he is. Isn't that awesome? He's like, twice the size I was at his age." His eyes are wet but he's smiling like this is the best day of his life. "You're awesome," he says to James. "You're both awesome."

James' hair is dark auburn with the occasional gleaming strand of bright red in it, but his eyes are the same blue as Pepper. He's wearing a blue tee-shirt with Captain America's shield on it, black jeans and sneakers with neat white socks. It's very much like what Bucky wears; Pepper wonders if James chose it.

Tony comes closer and Pepper moves so he can get a better look at Ash, who smiles dreamily at him from Pepper's shoulder. 

"That's my brother," James says proudly to Tony.

"I know, kiddo," Tony says. "Hey, Ash. How you doing, little guy?"

Ash waves. "I flied in a airplane!"

"That's great," Tony says warmly. Ash smiles at him, but then tucks his forehead against Pepper's neck.

"He's a little tired," Colonel Lorne says. Pepper had almost forgotten the two officers from Stargate Command were even there. "It's good to see you, Pepper."

"You too, Evan," Pepper says. She reaches out with the arm not wrapped around Ash and rubs James' back. "Thank you for bringing us our boys."

"Our pleasure, Ma'am," Sheppard says, smiling. "It's kind of our specialty."

Evan cups the back of Ash' head. "The Doc wanted me to tell you that James has most of his history. Just almost none of the bad stuff."

"Uh-huh." James nods. "I used to be nine, but Carson says I can grow up now."

"I know. I know you can. It's going to be so cool," Tony says, hugging James a little tighter. "But, uh, what do you mean by 'most'?" he asks Evan.

"I was a Howling Commando!" James says.

Tony and Pepper stare at Evan.

"Diluted," Evan says quickly. "Most, but diluted. He's a kid. Definitely still a kid."

"I'm glad," Pepper says. She'd argued for this with Tony, but now she just hopes that James won't have any trouble reconciling his distant past with his present.

He certainly doesn't seem to be having any trouble. "I'm almost six!" he says.

"Yeah, you are. Aren't you, buddy?" Tony says, grinning at him.

"So big!" Pepper says, grinning as well. James grins hugely back.

"I'm three!" Ash says.

James leans away from Tony to pat Ash on the back. "That's my brother Ash," he tells Pepper.

"I can see that. You both look like your father," Pepper says to James. Ash looks more like Tony than James, who has much lighter eyes, but they both have similarities in their faces. She pushes the hair back from James' face, her palm lingering on the boy's cheek. "They're perfect," she says to Sheppard over her shoulder. She swallows. "Thank you."

Sheppard smiles at her. "I'll be sure to tell Rodney you said so."

Tony snaps his head up to look at him. "McKay? Seriously?" He gestures in between James and Ash. "He did this?"

"Well, I'm sure genetics had something to do with it," Sheppard says dryly. "But, yep. Rodney McKay."

"Please thank him for me," Pepper says. She's smiling at James, Ash boneless in her arms with his head nestled on her shoulder, and she's feeling like this is the best day of her life, too. "Would you like to come upstairs and see your room?"

"Yeah. Is it on your floor? Is it the room I slept in last time?"

"Sure is, buddy," Tony says.

"Thank you," Pepper says to Evan and Sheppard again. She's lost track of how many times she's thanked them, but she knows it'll never be enough. Not for a gift like this.

"It was our pleasure, really," Evan says.

"Do you need a place to stay for the night?" Pepper asks them, trying to be a good host. It's very hard to take her attention away from the boys.

"Thank you, but our ride's waiting," Evan says. He smiles at her and Tony like he knows exactly how they're feeling. 

"Take care of your brother, James," Sheppard says. "You too, Ash."

"I will," James says seriously.

"Uh-huh," Ash says.

"Bye, guys," Evan says.

The boys both wave, and then it's just Tony and Pepper and Ash and James in the lobby.

"Right now you and Ash are sharing," Tony says, carefully stooping to grab the duffel bag Evan left. "We can give you your own room if you want, but we figured that maybe you'd like being together. Is that okay?"

James leans back so he can look at Tony. It's clear he has no concern at all that Tony might drop him. "Yeah," James says, still serious. "Ash's little. He might get scared. And if he's cold, he can come into my bed and get warm."

"That's very thoughtful of you," Pepper says. She rubs Ash's back. He's half-asleep. "But you have us now. You don't have to look after him by yourself."

James seems to think about that. "'Cause you're my mom and dad, right?"

"Exactly." Pepper grins.

"For how long?" James asks. He's not exactly suspicious, just…uncertain. Even with the memories diluted, like Evan said, she knows James has a long history of losing everything important to him.

"For always," Tony says. "Always and always and always."

"You and Ash are ours, now," Pepper says. "Just like we're yours. Forever."

James doesn't answer, but he smiles at her, then puts his head on Tony's shoulder and holds on tight.


	10. Epilogue

"Please, please remind me to never, ever go to another conference again," Tony says. "No, scratch that. Remind me to never leave the tower."

"That may make being an Avenger difficult," Pepper says.

"I don't care." Tony gives the limo driver entirely too much money for a tip, then stares mournfully at his suitcase mocking him with its heaviness. "How can you be so…"

"Mobile? Awake? Uncomplaining? Clean?" Pepper offers sweetly. She swings her bag onto her shoulder, grabs the handle of her small suitcase, then the handle of Tony's much larger one. She looks up at the tower, takes a deep breath and then walks into the building.

"Hey, I'm totally clean," Tony protests, following her crisp, long strides towards the tower's private elevator. He blinks owlishly. "Wait. Did I brush my teeth before we left?"

"Not since the stopover in Tokyo," Pepper says, yawning. "How do you suppose the boys are doing?"

"Well, if they were dead or in the hospital I'm sure someone would've called us," Tony says. The elevator finally arrives and he goes in and leans against the wall of the car. He closes his eyes, only for them to snap open. "They _would've_ called us, right?" he asks her anxiously. "I mean, the boys've been with us for over six months, and there was the news release to let people know we're parents. So the hospital would call, right?"

"Yes, they would've called us," Pepper says seriously. She puts her hand on Tony's shoulder. "I'm sure they're fine."

"Yeah. That's what I thought," Tony murmurs. He tips his head back against the wall, eyes drifting shut.

"Don't fall asleep in the elevator," Pepper says, prodding him until he opens his eyes. She lets out a deep sigh and checks her watch. "I can't believe we were only gone a week. It feels like a month. It's crazy, how much I miss them. Maybe we should take them out of school early."

"Yeah, cool," Tony mumbles, closing his eyes again. "But that's why neither of us should ever leave the tower. It'd be perfect. We could sleep in every day, home school the kids…"

Pepper snorts inelegantly. "You just wouldn't sleep ever. And you'd never have the patience—"

The elevator doors open and the first thing Tony and Pepper hear is a window-rattling shriek and then what sounds like several herds of elephants.

"Oh, my God!" Pepper looks at Tony, horrified.

They leave the suitcases and rush out of the elevator in time to realize they're on the common floor instead of their own, and then to nearly get trampled by Steve. He's shirtless and looks mildly terrified, racing past them like he's trying to outrun Red Skull's entire army.

"Whoops! Sorry!" Steve turns gracefully and leaps out of their way, then skids to a halt on his bare feet. "Um, welcome back," he says, though his expression is way more 'oh-fuck-I'm-in-trouble' than 'glad-to-see-you'. 

He glances back the way he came, then winces and heroically steps in front of a still-blinking Pepper and Tony to face the screaming onrush of pursuit. The rampaging horde consists of Bucky and James with nearly identical expressions of homicidal glee, then Clint with Ash clinging to his back and shrieking like an excited monkey. They're all barefoot and shirtless, and all carrying Nerf guns. Except for Ash, who has a red dishtowel as a cape and needs both hands to hold onto Clint.

"Take him down, boys!" Bucky yells.

Steve puts his hands up in surrender. "Wait! Wait! Stop!"

"No mercy!" Bucky crows, and then the barrage starts. In seconds Steve's covered with suction-cup foam darts from his waist to his forehead.

Pepper steps neatly around him. "Could someone tell me what's going on here, please?"

"Mommy!" Ash hollers in Clint's ear, then scramble-slides off his back, ducks between his legs and barely gives Pepper time to crouch before he throws himself into her arms.

"Dad!" James puts his gun down—carefully, like Bucky taught him—then runs to Tony. He jumps and Tony catches him in a hug.

"Hey. Hey, kiddo. I missed you." Tony drops a kiss on James' cheek then gently sets him down. "Ash! C'mere, monkey." He hugs the three-year old while James hugs Pepper.

"Hi," Bucky says. He looks desperately at Steve, who's too busy yanking off darts to offer any help, then squares his shoulders. "We were practicing combat techniques," he says in his best Winter Soldier voice.

Pepper just blinks at him. "With Nerf guns. In the common room."

"Yes?"

"You never know where the enemy will strike, Ma'am," Clint says solemnly.

"Sure. What the hell. Let's pretend this actually was combat training," Tony says. He's still carrying Ash and he puts his hand on James' shoulder when the other boy gets close enough. "That doesn't explain why my children aren't in school. Which won't be finished for another hour and a half. Or why you're all half naked."

"It was Steve's idea," Bucky says.

Steve turns big, wounded eyes on Bucky. "Bucky…!"

"The principal had to call them," James says.

"Oh, fucking hell," Tony says on a blast of air. "Don't say that," he tells Ash.

"Fucking hell!" Ash repeats immediately, and then bashfully stuffs a finger in his mouth at his mother's raised eyebrow.

"What happened?" Pepper asks. She crouches down again so she's eye-level with James. "Was there another fight?"

James nods, looking both miserable and defiant and so much like his mother it's uncanny, despite their difference in coloring. James has darker hair and Tony's olive skin, but his eyes and the way he's holding himself make it easy to imagine Pepper as a six year-old, standing just like that in front of her mother. And probably for the same reason.

"Did you start it?"

James nods again.

Tony winces, but Pepper keeps her expression neutral. "Can you tell me why?"

"Mark pushed me off the slide at recess," James says.

"What? Are you okay? Did you get hurt?" Tony asks, prepared to hand Ash to someone and check James for injuries. Or call the med suite.

"No, I'm okay. I did the roll Natasha taught me," James says proudly.

"That's awesome," Tony says, meaning it.

"I'm very glad you didn't get hurt," Pepper says. "Then what happened?"

"Ash saw it, and he ran over and started hitting Mark," James says. "And then Mark hit him back, and I hit Mark."

Tony turns to Ash, still nestled happily in his arms. "Where did you get hit? Are _you_ okay?"

"Here." Ash smacks his hand to the side of his head a few times, but it's impossible to see any bruise under his hair, which is thick as Tony's and as dark orange as a brush fire.

"Are you okay?" Tony asks again.

"Uh-huh." Ash nods. "I did like this." He turns his head quickly, rolling with the imaginary punch and nearly clocking Tony in the nose. 

"That's awesome too," Tony says, smiling to hide the trace of concern. He knows how Ash normally moves, and that wasn't typical three-year old coordination. That was something Grant Ward knew, passed on as motor memory.

It's not a _bad_ thing. It's just, Tony's worried that one day Ash will ask why he knows things he doesn't remember learning. And Tony has no idea what he'll tell him.

At least right now he has more immediate and ordinary problems. 

"Did you hit Mark first?" Pepper asks Ash.

"Uh-huh."

"Because he pushed James?"

"Uh-huh." Ash squirms to get out of Tony's arms. He hugs James violently as soon as he's on the floor.

"That sounds pretty cool to me," Clint says, shrugging.

"Me too," says Bucky.

"Me three!" James adds, over the top of Ash's head.

Steve, Tony has not failed to notice, has remained conspicuously silent through the whole thing.

"The problem, James, is that you and Ash know how to fight like Avengers, and Mark only knows how to fight like a little boy," Pepper says. "No one has the right to hurt you, and I always want you to defend yourself or your brother. But you have to remember that you know how to hurt people really badly."

"And Ash is too little to really understand that," Tony adds. "Which means you have to take responsibility and stop him."

"I know," James says seriously. He gently disentangles himself from Ash, who looks around and then seems to choose Steve at random to get picked up. "But I didn't have to stop him. I had to hit Mark."

"To defend Ash, who was enacting righteous vengeance on your behalf," Tony says.

"Yeah."

"You're six. How do you know what 'enacting righteous vengeance' even means?" Clint asks James.

James grins toothily at him. "From burning Hydra bases."

Bucky extends his hand. "Totally righteous."

James high-fives him.

"Okay, that will never stop freaking me out, when you do that," Tony says to both of them. He gives himself a quick shake, then cards his fingers through his hair. "So, this Mark kid started it, but James ended it with, I'm assuming, extreme prejudice. How badly hurt was he?"

James shrugs. "I punched him in the stomach. He cried."

"Did he throw up?"

"Just a little."

"Great." Tony rubs his forehead. "Were they expelled?"

"No," Steve finally speaks up.

"Were they suspended, then?" Pepper asks. 

"No."

"Sent home early?"

Steve and Bucky look at each other.

"So you took them home early?"

"No, we went to the park," Bucky says.

"We got ice cream!" Ash adds happily from Steve's arms.

"That's nice," Tony says. "Did you leave your shirts at school?"

Ash thinks that's hilarious, because he's three. "No, daddy! We put 'em in the laundry."

"The ice cream, um, dripped," Steve says.

"When we had a food fight," Clint clarifies.

"And then you came home and hauled out the Nerf weapons?"

"For combat training," Bucky says.

"We cleaned up first," Steve adds, looking hopeful.

"And yet, no shirts."

"The darts stick better on skin." Clint shrugs when Tony stares at him. "They do."

Bucky nods. "It's important." He coughs. "For the combat training."

"Okay, okay. Help me out here," Tony says. "Pepper and I get back from Hong Kong to find out the principal of our kids' extremely expensive private school—where we're very happy to send you, because you're important and awesome and totally worth it—" he adds for the boys' benefit, "had to call you because, no matter how justified, James hit a kid hard enough to make him throw up. And then, the three of you decide that the best way of dealing with this is to let them skip half a day of school. Then you take them to the park, give them ice cream at, I'm assuming, roughly the same time they'd be getting the wholesome and actual food snacks the very expensive private school provides for them. And then you don't eat it in favor of throwing it at each other. And _then_ you bring them home and proceed to go _Full Metal Jacket_ with Nerf guns on Captain America. And I'm just going to assume that no homework has gotten done either, even though it's due on Thursday morning."

"Well, when you say it like that, it sounds kinda bad," Bucky says.

"It is kind of bad!" Tony says. "It is unbelievably, appallingly bad! You're Avengers! I should be able to trust the safety and moral sanctity of my children to you, but oh, no. Instead you…Are you laughing?"

"I'm sorry," Pepper says, trying to stifle her giggles, the traitor. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to. But, 'the safety and moral sanctity of my children' was just, really funny."

"I hate you," Tony says.

"You hate mommy?" Ash's brown eyes widen in horror.

"No, no, of course not. I love your mommy. I was kidding. I was just kidding, I promise. Come here." He scoops Ash, who is now sniffling, away from Steve. "I'm sorry. That was a bad joke. I didn't mean it."

"So, what were you berating us for again, before making your own kid cry?" Bucky asks innocently.

"James still has plenty of time to do homework before bed," Pepper says before Tony can get back to his perfectly reasonable indignation. Because she's still a traitor. "And I honestly think that one afternoon playing hooky and eating ice cream—"

"Food fighting with ice cream," Tony says.

"Food fighting with ice cream." Pepper rolls her eyes. "Will not hurt them. And I'll call the school tomorrow and find out what can be done about this Mark boy. And…" She looks at Clint, Bucky and Steve. "What would you think about teaching James and Ash how to protect themselves without necessarily hurting anyone? Don't get me wrong," she says to James, "I firmly believe that if someone hits you, you have the right to hit them back. But I don't want you to get in trouble for it. This might be a good compromise. What do you think?"

James considers it. "Okay," he says.

"Awesome," Tony says, then yawns. "I'm going to take a wild guess here that Ash didn't get a nap today, either."

That gets three matching expressions of guilt.

"Yeah. You guys are officially the worst babysitters ever, just saying. Ash and I are going to take a nap. You coming?" Tony asks Pepper.

"No, thank you. I won't be able to sleep tonight if I do."

"Your loss. How about you, kiddo?" he asks James.

James wrinkles his nose. "Naps are for babies."

"Right on," Bucky agrees. They high-five again.

"Can I do my homework on Steve and Bucky's floor?" James asks.

"Sackemtatoes! Sackemtatoes!" Ash demands.

Tony obligingly lifts him so that he's carrying Ash over his shoulder, holding him by his ankle while his head and arms dangle over Tony's back and his dishtowel cape flops over his head. "It's fine by me," he says to James, "provided it's okay with Steve and Bucky and your mom. And you put on a shirt. And you actually get your homework done. And if they feed you, that it's healthy food. That doesn't come out of a box."

"If I do my homework, do I have to put on a shirt?"

"Yes," Tony says.

"No," says Pepper at the same time. She shrugs when Tony looks at her. "He's inside."

"What if it's healthy food that comes out of a box?" Bucky asks Tony. "We have organic toaster pastries."

"You finished those this morning," Steve says primly. He blinks at Tony, looking like butter wouldn't melt in his virtuously patriotic mouth. "But we do have all-natural graham crackers."

"What about cheese slices? Those don't come in a box," Clint adds.

"Why are you tormenting me?" Tony says to the three men in general.

"I love graham crackers," James says. "Can I have those? Steve says they're healthy."

Tony looks at James' blue puppy-eyes and he starts grinning despite himself. "You know I love you, right?"

"Uh-huh," James says happily. He hugs Tony again, probably because he knows he's got this in the bag. Tony ruffs up his hair with the hand not holding Ash steady. "Can I have graham crackers at Steve and Bucky's?"

"Fine. Sure, whatever," Tony says on a sigh. "But when you fall into a diabetic coma, don't come running to me. I'm going to be taking a nap with my sensible, obedient child." He tickles one of Ash's bare feet, making sure he has a good grip on his ankle so when the kid shrieks and kicks in glee he won't fall on his head.

"He can't run if he's in a coma," Clint says.

"Worst. Babysitters. Ever." Tony walks to the elevator, carrying Ash.

* * *

"Tell me a story," James says.

"I don't know, it's kind of late. Your folks are going to worry about you," Bucky says.

"They know where I am, and Dad doesn't mean it about you guys being awful babysitters." James stretches and tries to stifle a yawn. "They said they were both going to bed super early anyway. And I finished my homework and I know how to get home. It's just upstairs." He turns his big blue eyes on Bucky. "Please?"

"All right, all right already. Fine, I'll tell you a story," Bucky says, giving in easily. It's not like he doesn't want to. "What kind of story? A pretend one, or a real one?"

"A real one," James says immediately. He leans into Bucky's side on the couch. "Tell me one about when you and Steve were Howling Commandos."

"Well, if you want a real one, maybe Steve should tell it," Bucky says. "He's better at remembering the details than I am."

"You do fine, Buck," Steve says. He's sitting in a chair across from Bucky and James, head bent over whatever he's drawing. "Besides, I want to hear it too."

"All right," Bucky says. He leans back as he thinks of what he can tell, curling his arm around James.

It's weird. At first he was worried that being near James would be like looking in a funhouse mirror all the time, seeing another version of himself reflected back at him. And maybe not such a pretty one, neither. He wasn't even sure he'd _like_ the kid, considering he was basically a living, breathing piece of Bucky's mental illness.

(Sam calls it a survival mechanism; Bucky thinks the fact it almost killed him makes illness a better fit.)

But the kid doesn't even look like him. Nothing beyond similar hair- and eye-color, which is pretty much just a coincidence. He knows a lot of people think they're related, though, which he figures makes sense since they share memories. He can see himself in the way James moves, sometimes, or in the way he reacts to things. There's a heck of a lot of James' parents in there, but enough of Bucky to give them a connection.

Like they're related. Bucky really likes it.

"Okay, I got a good one," he says. "You might have to help me out with this though, Steve, in case I forget something."

Steve lifts his head. "Sure. But I can't promise I'll remember it any better than you."

"Oh, you might," Bucky says, smirking. "Here we go," he says to James. "Once upon a time—"

"You said you were going to tell me a real story."

"I am. All good stories start like that. You gonna listen, or give me a hard time?"

"I'm listening," James says quickly.

"Good. So, once upon a time, there was a boy named Steve. And he lived in a place called Brooklyn, which is like here, but not nearly as swank. Now, Steve was a tiny, skinny, scrawny little thing—"

"Hey," Steve protests mildly.

"A tiny, skinny, scrawny, asthmatic little thing with a bad heart," Bucky amends, then grins when Steve glares at him. "But the thing was, this little guy, his heart might not've worked right, but that's because it was the wrong heart. Y'see, Steve had the heart of a lion. The heart of a hero. But he didn't know that at the time, right? After all, how does anybody know what kind of heart they got when they get born? All Steve knew was that his heart always beat too fast when it shouldn't. But that was because it was a lion's heart in the wrong body. It was meant to be in the body Steve should've been born with, but he wasn't. So—"

Steve's head snaps up. "Wait. That's not how it goes. That's wrong."

Bucky frowns, confused. "That's your story. I'm just embellishing it a little."

"What's wrong with it?" James asks.

"Well, most of it's right," Steve says, "I was born skinny and scrawny and short. And I had asthma and got sick all the time. But I didn't have the heart of a lion."

"I know, Steve," Bucky says, getting annoyed. "It's a _story_ , for Pete's sake. Are you gonna let me tell it already?"

"I didn't have the heart of a lion," Steve goes on like Bucky didn't say anything. For some reason he's blushing a little. "Bucky's right, though. My heart wasn't in the right body."

"Where was it?" James asks.

Steve's blushing red now, but he smiles and he sits up straight, like what he's going to say is important.

"Bucky had it," Steve says. "Bucky took it from me the moment we met. And he kept it, and that's what made it strong. And that's why I'm not going to lose you," he says to Bucky. "Because you have my heart."

"Oh," Bucky says, then has to swallow a few times. "Steve, I—"

"Wait," James says. "Which one of you is the lion? And if you have his heart, how come he's still alive?"

"You guys really _are_ the worst babysitters ever," James laments a few minutes later, because Steve and Bucky can't tell him the story anymore. Every time one of them tries, they get to the lion part and start laughing.

 

END

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As usual, I must give enormous thanks to [Squeaky](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Squeaky/works), who not only gave me the idea that spawned this work in the first place, but suggested dialogue, plot points, and helped me figure out what the hell should come next when I had no idea what to write. She even betaed this monster and read it over a crazy number of times. Thank you for being my sister, best bud, and awesome muse.
> 
> The power plant is based on the abandoned (and now demolished) [Glenwood Power Plant in Yonkers, N.Y.](http://untappedcities.com/2013/09/24/interior-demolition-abandoned-glenwood-power-plant-yonkers/%20).
> 
> The quote Taylor tells Ward comes from [Hermann Hesse](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hermann_Hesse).
> 
> The portion of the fic's title in parenthesis comes from alternate lyrics to the song [Sixteen Tons](http://www.folkarchive.de/sixteen.html) (found near the bottom of the page). It's been a tradition to use _Sixteen Tons_ for the titles of the [Scruffy AI](http://archiveofourown.org/series/14258) Series.
> 
> The specific stories from that series referred to here are [Male Enhancement (The Soul and the Company Store Remix)](http://archiveofourown.org/works/318443), [Muscle and Blood and Skin and Bones](http://archiveofourown.org/works/318768), and [Poor Man, Made](http://archiveofourown.org/works/506823) (which was written by Squeaky).
> 
> Finally, this Story fills the **Possession/Mind Control** square of my [H/C Bingo](http://hc-bingo.livejournal.com/) [Card](http://taste-is-sweet.livejournal.com/85941.html).

**Author's Note:**

> Look! Now I'm on [Tumblr!](http://taste-is-sweet.tumblr.com/) Please follow me! I am lonely and pathetic. I'm also [here](https://about.me/aundreasinger), where I'm moderately cooler. :) ♥


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